


No one knows

by MechanicalHeart



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Armitage Hux Has Issues, Bottom Armitage Hux, Darth Tantrum and his Evil Space Ginger, Force Bond (Star Wars), Force-Sensitive Armitage Hux, Inappropriate Use of the Force, M/M, Mutual Masturbation, Mutual Pining, Rimming, Sleep Deprivation, Substance Abuse, Suicidal Thoughts, Top Kylo Ren, Virgin Armitage Hux
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-07
Updated: 2020-09-29
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:02:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 24,749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26343826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MechanicalHeart/pseuds/MechanicalHeart
Summary: General Hux has devoted his life and soul to the First Order. But things aren't going well. The Finalizer is falling apart where he stands and corruption and intrigue run deep. Every day is a trial, every night an ordeal. He is so exhausted he hears voices in his head, sometimes.And he thinks about Kylo. Always.
Relationships: Armitage Hux/Kylo Ren
Comments: 11
Kudos: 296





	1. 0001 : Time madness

**Author's Note:**

> Beware: this fanfic is 50% me torturing Huxiebuxie with work, exhaustion, sabotage, rebels, Kylo's attitude and sleep deprivation, especially in the beginning. (I personally had tons of fun doing this)

He constantly checked the chronometers.  
Regardless of where his body was located he remained a person, a human being, that odd-looking result of centuries of passing on of damaged DNA, meaning that he would forever remain weak, forever weak in the same places. Dependence on a day ruled by the cycles of planets and the light of whichever sun was nearby. Thirsting for vitamins and other randomly thrown together chemicals he, too, for some ineffable reason, required to keep his blood running, keep his heart beating. All of these expenses and sacrifices just to keep the vessel going. Even if it was a sub-par heap of junk that was not worth the effort. The insurmountable problem was that there was no escape door on it. It was pathetic and it made him sick; that feeling of having no choice but to obey the commands of his physique. The chrono’s could keep it at bay. The chrono’s could make him forget so he could focus on what was in front of him. If humanity had never invented a way to divide time, that never-ending maelstrom of screaming futility, into small and mentally manageable chunks, he would never have been able to bear it. His mind would have collapsed in on itself like a submarine miles below the surface of an ocean. Years ago. Ergo, General Hux had half of his gaze on the numbers on the chronometers, always.

"It's time to leave."  
He checked the chrono below the alarm dashboard in hallway T-19 one more time when Ren did not answer, just to ascertain he was right. Ren did not even acknowledge him; he usually didn't seem to hear him when he said something. But he was correct. Ren's shuttle was set to leave the mother ship in shortly. So, he said it again: "It's time to leave."  
Two prying eyes glared at him through strands of black hair. "I know."  
“Good.”  
It was still a considerably long walk to the launch gates. Hux walked onwards, on Ren’s side. It was interesting, Hux entertained a fleeting thought (it did not serve a practical purpose and was better left alone): there were layers to silence. Not in a physical meaning, perhaps, but socially. Like a cross-section, the silence between Ren and himself was exposed by the murmur and bustle around them. People, creatures everywhere around them, doing things like cogs in a machine. Talking amongst themselves. Never penetrating the dome of silence that seemed to crash down on them whenever and wherever they went. Even when they did speak, it was quiet. Nothing would be said; nothing of substance. Hux could not explain it or elaborate on it any further and returned his thoughts to his even steps; the rhythm of his heels on the floor. His breathing. He needed to pay more attention to his breathing.  
“Do you honestly have to escort me? I mean, is there really this absolute necessity to show me where I need to be when I have walked here every day of every year I have been on this ship?”  
“There is a protocol. I have my orders.”  
“Yes, I know you have your orders.”  
“And I will complete them.”  
“Yes, I know you will. But “general” Hux-,” (why did he hear those quotation marks around his title every single time Ren spoke them?) “you are a smartass, right? You are the top of your class. You can think further than your orders and you are capable of standing above them. I would hope so, at least. You know when an idea is stupid, you know when an order makes no sense. I know you do. So what is your problem? Cause I can’t figure it out. You are wasting your time and I don’t get it.”  
“That is fine.”  
An eyeroll, a groan, finally a sigh. And silence. A thick-layered silence, like meters of snow in the night. And the interesting thing was that it really was fine. This was just the way their conversations always ended and Hux was used to it by now, like he was used to every other facet of his life aboard this ship, as part of the Order. He was grateful, even, that Ren had not insisted on having the last word this time. They simply did not meet in the middle. About anything. If Hux said a planet they were approaching was blue, Ren would say it was red. It was a daily struggle, Hux had to admit to himself. But their superiors must have had their reasons. Hux believed that everything in the First Order served a purpose, even if it that purpose seemed insignificant or detrimental at first. In this way, the First Order was like a microcosm of the way they imagined their ideal system to be. And the strongest metal was forged under pressure. It could not grow into its perfect shape without it. Hux had learned as much during the years.

Ren picked up his pace once the transporters came into view. Following him was not worth the effort. Hux changed nothing about his tempo. He had already seen the door meant for the commander was still firmly closed and Ren would have to wait, regardless of his haste to leave him behind.  
If only he would have been capable of some distance, some rational perspective on himself, Hux thought to himself, he would have been remarkable. He would have been an unstoppable force. It was such a shame knowing what could have been if only he would decide to grow up. Hux had seen others fail who did the same. A great many others. Promising children, talented students, motivated recruits. And they all tumbled headfirst in the same trap. The moment there was any hardship, the moment things grew outside of their control and comfort, they gave up. Like useless cowards. While the single thing they needed was right within themselves. Was within everyone. He shook his head. Wasted potential made him feel a certain way. He believed there was a specific word for it. Was it wistful? It came close.  
“I wish you a safe and successful trip, Commander Ren,” he said, going through the official motions, making sure there was no expression on his face or any kind of wavering in his voice.  
The doors opened, slowly. Ren looked over his shoulder, at Hux, just for a moment. As soon as the way was free for him he walked up the gangway and disappeared from sight.

His expression was not an easily recognizable one and Hux had never been good at reading faces. He categorized it under ‘blank’. He knew it hadn’t been just that. There was no way of knowing what it had been, exactly. No use lingering on it.

There is a concept called “time madness”. It occurs sporadically in travelers who have been alone for long periods of time. The emptiness of space is so great, so immense to imperfect, unevolved creatures, that their brain cannot grasp it and their attention inevitably turns somewhere else. Their minds flow naturally towards a place where they feel more comfortable. The clock is often where their thoughts seek refuge from the lightyears around them. Not just because it brings a certain order and logic to their existence, but also because it is often the only thing there to pay attention to. Obsessively checking the date and time, the minutes, the seconds, writing them down at every turn, at every action or chore they do aboard their ships, they spiral into insanity. They lose track of what is around them. The passing time becomes the center of their universe and, eventually, their demise.

Hux found himself thinking about this disorder now and then. It happened again when he stood and watched Ren’s shuttle depart. He was still following protocol, look: his body was where it was supposed to be, his feet were below his hips, where they should be; his posture was upright and his vitals were all perfect as far as his daily check-up had told him that morning. There wasn’t a single thing any patrolling officer or monitoring camera could take offense at. But my mind is a mess, he thought, naming what he felt on the inside for the first time, and knew it was true. When the mind is disorganized, how can one ever hope to bring order to anything outside of it?  
General Hux waited patiently until the shuttles had exited the Finalizer and the big trap door was shut behind them. He wondered what a man should do when he is fractured on the inside. He had no answers; he had never studied anything about this. What he feared was the following: the possibility that a defect in his core made everything else that he did unstable, unreliable and therefore worthless. If it was anybody else, he would have said that it did.  
He thought of Ren. It wasn’t because he had just given him and his party a farewell salute. It pained him to realize this, but he wasn’t the kind of man who denies the truth: he always thought of Ren. Somehow, nothing was important enough to erase Ren from his thoughts. It was detrimental to his work, it was pathological.  
He was gone, now, and would be out of his hairs for a good, long while. Hux had longed for him to be gone. He had noticed that he slept much better and that his efficiency improved when he was away. It allowed him space to breathe, to make way for what really mattered- the First Order. When Ren was near, he found that it was impossible.  
The relief Hux desired was slow. It came with a delay, always. Maybe in a few days, he would feel better. Maybe this time around, he would forget about him until he returned. But right now, he couldn’t even take his eyes off the spot he had stood on, couldn’t stop seeing him in his imagination as he had stood there. Right there. His feet in his boots and his boots on the metal. He remembered the shape of his legs and of his gloved hands, every strand of hair, the look in his eyes. As they had looked at him.  
“Blank”. It had been more than blank.

Hux frowned. He managed to get his facial muscles under control almost immediately but it still annoyed him. His head was in so much pain. His headache seemed to pound the sides of his skull, slamming itself against its sides with every heartbeat. Hux closed his eyes for a brief moment. He then turned his back on the launch pad and started his walk to the bridge. There were plenty of tasks waiting for him and there were only so many waking hours.

A droid passed him when he was near the command center and he almost bumped into it, the surprise sending a quick, flaring pain through his head. The thing bleeped an apology. Hux hardly heard it through the buzzing in his ears. I wish I could be one of those things, he thought. Sure, he would be a clunk of metal. But he would be functional. Made for set purposes instead of whatever it was that he was made for. He would choose metal and cogs over flesh and bone, any day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Time madness is real. It's sometimes seen in solo sailors on long journeys.


	2. 0002 : Hallucinations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hux is on his last legs.   
> It seems that all he does all day is putting out fires while new disasters keep popping up. Nobody is happy, least of all Hux, who tries to keep it together with pills. What can he do to keep the voices in his head at bay, though?

The fifth day after Kylo's departure had been awful. The seventh day had been worse.   
“Things have a tendency to all go wrong at once, don’t they,” one of his commander colleagues said to him. A stupid misconception based on faulty thought patterns, he knew that- but Hux had to admit many things _were_ going wrong at once. A monitor showed extensive damage on the starboard side of the ship. It was so bad that the stars could be seen through the hole in its side, even on the screen. Personnel was on site and working as hard as they could to fix it but with no available cranes, what were they supposed to do?  
Sparks were flying on another monitor, this one projecting the situation in the cargo hold where (Hux guessed) some artillery had gone haywire. Haywire, or was it sabotaged?   
“General,” a senior officer addressed him. He had been waiting for Hux’s orders but his patience seemed to be wearing thin. “Which cranes can we deploy to start fixing the damage?”  
Hux did everything he could to stop his face from twitching. His head was giving him absolute torture, far worse than yesterday- something that he could not even have imagined before today.   
“Check the cargo. There are bound to be some spares.”  
“Cargo hold’s been compromised.” The officer pointed at the monitor Hux had just been looking at. “I would go but nobody has authorized access except for the special artillery unit until they have stopped whatever’s going on there.”  
Everyone on the bridge was looking at him, waiting for what he would say. Hux felt all of their eyes on him and prayed that they would all- not drop dead, he still needed them- but just leave him alone. They knew, as well as he did, that the only other cranes available were working on the Starkiller core. They knew that the Starkiller core was absolute priority. Everyone who could help was working on it, day and night, because there was no time. The rebels were on their way and they would reach it before it was finished. Unless all their energy and funds were directed at the Starkiller. They might have a bit of a chance, in that case.  
For politics, for diplomacy, for simple decorum, senior staff needed to be nonchalant about what was going on; it was essential that everyone emanated that everything was under control. It was the only way to keep everyone with them, to hold the Order together. They were all doing their best, keeping up the facade every moment of every day, and everyone knew that everyone did this. The atmosphere was tense and had been for months. Among senior staff, who were the most informed, this was even worse. The slightest misstep, a single wrong impression, and everything could come down.   
“Take one or two from the Starkiller construction.”  
The senior officer breathed a sigh of relief.  
“No more than two, officer.”  
“Understood, General.”  
“Dismissed.” Hux looked around, seeing all his coworkers quickly avert their eyes. “Tell the forced labor units 67 and 34 to travel at maximum speed and be here before midnight,” he told one of his staff, who ran off to do as instructed.  
“I’m going to inspect the cargo hold,” he announced and walked off the bridge, happy to not have to see them for a while. He took a vial from his coat and shook it. A pill fell on his palm. He swallowed it, hoping that it would keep the pain at bay for a few hours. Please, he thought. Please.

The disturbance in the cargo hold was sabotage. No doubt about it. After having listened to the reports of the supervisors it was clear enough that an accident like this could not have happened without authorized staff interfering. It was not a big problem per se; the damage was limited and would be fixed swiftly, Hux trusted. The cargo hold should be open again for all authorized staff by tomorrow. Too late to bring in the cranes from there, but it would do. The bigger issue was keeping this incident a secret from the rest of the ship. Another sabotage was precisely what they, as an organization, did not need at this moment. Any reluctance to commit to the bigger plan had to be kept small and contained, and resistance cells needed to be separated from one another.  
Hux gave his orders: the area would be combed for evidence, there would be thorough interrogations and no returning to personal quarters until the person responsible confessed. He would have liked to stick around to see how the supervisors would handle this. Unfortunately, he had to get back to the bridge to update the status of the Starkiller core, see Snoke for their regularly scheduled meeting, do his daily work out and try to get this fucking headache under control, it was _killing_ him, couldn’t they give him a break? For _one_ fucking second?  
He walked into the elevator that would take him out of the cargo hold. He wanted to sit down on the floor. Just for the elevator ride. But he knew that if he did so he would not manage to get himself up again. So, he leaned his forehead to the cold steel of the elevator, instead, for a hint of relief. He closed his eyes, shielding them from the stark, blueish light. And thought of Ren.   
_Kylo_ , his pained head thought through its medicated haze. _Kylo_.

His legs, there was something wrong with his legs. His knees trembled with every step. It was something only Hux noticed, something completely invisible, but it was alarming. Maybe he had contracted something, a virus?   
Not now, Hux prayed to nothing in particular, sending his wishes into empty space. I can’t get sick, I can’t rest. Just a bit longer. Just hold on a bit longer.  
He walked through the thickest doors the ship’s interior had, through triple rows of guards, into the chambers of his supreme leader. Kneeling down at the end of the corridor, awaiting Snoke’s address, the tremor in his knees was even more pronounced. There was nothing he could do but ignore it, stow it away as deep within himself as he could. It worked. It had always worked, even in front of Snoke; if Hux really wanted to hide something, he could. It was pure survival instinct. If anybody ever found out about his innate weaknesses, his inability to keep himself together, he would kill himself before they would. There were so many things he would rather die keeping a secret than he would ever confess to, more than he could count.

“General Hux,” his leader’s voice echoed through the hall.  
“Supreme leader Snoke,” he answered. Even the reflection of the dim lights on the glossy floor was too much for him.  
“You are aware that the Starkiller core is top priority,” he said. It was not a question. Hux already knew what was coming and wished he would keep it short.  
“I am.”  
“Then you are also aware of the grave mistake you have made earlier today.”  
“I am.”  
“Start bringing in more workers. We need half the galaxy on that core.”  
“Supreme leader Snoke, I already pushed the remaining forced labor units for urgency when I first heard of the possible delays on the core-“  
“Heard of them, General Hux? You caused those delays, did you not?”  
Hux gritted his teeth, a wave of pain washing over him. He was able to stay in position by breathing slowly and turning all his awareness to his muscles.  
“I thought so,” Snoke continued. “It will not suffice. We need more; get me more.”  
“I will do as you say.”  
“Good. Dismissed, General Hux.”  
Hux walked out of the hall on autopilot. He wanted another pill, and took one, even though he was only supposed to take two per day. His eyes couldn’t focus. It was annoying.

Around his usual bedtime he was looking at two more hours of overtime at the very least, if he was very lucky. Seeing how he was usually anything but, he gave it his all.  
Throughout the evening voices in his head picked on him, belittled him. They hissed that he was useless. They sighed at his words, or repeated them, mocking what he had said. Hux hadn’t heard them in months. He had even had a fool’s hope, for a bright couple of days, that he had lost them, that he had left them behind. And here they were, in full force: his teachers, his superiors back when he had been a not-particularly-strong recruit, his former commanders. It was a whole choir. His father. Snoke. And Ren.  
His head saved Ren for the worst moments. His head had made Ren laugh when Snoke had dismissed him earlier that day. Out loud; absolutely roaring with laughter. And when his colleague had come back to the bridge to tell him forced labor unit 67 had suffered severe damage and delays, and unit 34 was missing entirely, the Ren in his head had said, loud and clear: _just give up. You can’t do anything._

In the end, his options had been severely limited and the choice had been easy. He had transmitted a few explorers new instructions, sending them to other planets. Their ships were not built for transport of workers, but they would have to make do with what they had. On top of that, he transferred a large sum of money to slave dealers who had shady reputations at best. He had no idea what he would get for the First Order’s cash, but this was an emergency; there were no other colonies left to ship to the First Order settlements and money was not the issue right now. Hux convinced himself, because he had to. His coworkers on the bridge undoubtedly had their own ideas about his plans. Nobody spoke their mind. Which was the sensible thing to do, since Hux was so filled with pain and rage he would have called for immediate execution at the slightest jab at him. On the spot.

  
His feet were swaying when he, at long last, returned to his quarters. It was so difficult to walk in a straight line.   
_I hope you don’t wake up when you fall asleep_ , the Ren in his head snapped at him when he pressed the wrong button on the elevator. Hux corrected himself and the elevator smoothly lifted him to his destination. He was seeing a mix of tiny sparks and large black spots at this point. He hardly saw what his fingers were doing when they typed in the code to his quarters. The door opened. His spacious, fairly empty rooms welcomed him. He was so grateful.   
_Why don’t you take some more of those pills_ , Ren’s voice cruelly told him. He ignored him and retreated to his shower. His brains were pounding so hard Hux would have believed they were trying to crack open his skull and break free. He wouldn’t blame them.  
 _You know you don’t want tomorrow_.  
No, he didn’t.   
“But you are not Ren,” he whispered weakly as the hot water ran over his exhausted limbs. “You are not…” he hesitated. “Kylo.”  
His heart made a subtle squeeze and everything was suddenly so warm, far too warm. This was the only place on the ship where he could think freely. It was a shame that he was never here and when he was, he was practically comatose. Still, every minute he could spend in privacy had great value to him. And he thought of Kylo, through the pain, for as long as his mind would stay awake.  
It wasn’t long. These days, he didn’t even need the First Order standard issue sleeping aid. They were the best and had never failed him when sleep wouldn’t come naturally. Tonight would be fine, though. He almost lost consciousness when he dried his hair with a towel. He caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror. He looked the other way. He changed clothes. He switched off the lights. He walked to his bed. That was when a familiar voice spoke, in his head- but in contrast to what he normally had to say, he said:  
 _Hux. Can you hear me?  
_ Hux froze in his movements and stood still, the cold of the floor slowly chilling his bare feet. Waiting for the voice to say something else. It was Ren, no doubt about it. Again. But this was not ‘his’ Ren… or was it?   
How can I tell? Hux thought.   
_Hux, are you there?_ the voice repeated. Hux waited, holding his breath, not knowing what to do. Was he just losing his mind now? For real, this time? Had he met his limit today? It would not surprise him if he had.   
But that was the end. There was nothing more.   
There was a difference. It was small, but significant. He only realized what it was when he was in his bed, his head resting on the pillow. Hux had felt a very modest stream of air to his ear along with the whispered words. Breathing.   
“Are you still there?” he asked the darkness around him. The ship’s internal systems hummed. The engines on stationary mode, the air vents circulating oxygen to the staff’s quarters. The sounds of the battleship were background hubris to him, usually, but not now. He was listening, now. He felt ridiculous sending messages into nothing and yet, he tried again, with bated breath.  
“Ren?”  
All of a sudden, an overwhelming sense of abandonment descended on him. It was not just an emotion, it was palpable. It was everywhere, in every dust particle and every molecule floating around his rooms; a wall separating him from all other living souls, a wall that he would never be able to climb. And it was growing, he could feel it: it would overpower him and paralyze him until his existence would simply end. He rolled to his side, not wanting to stare at the emptiness any longer.   
Hux closed his eyes and fell asleep immediately. Being dormant was a basal refuge, maybe, but a refuge he would gladly take.


	3. 0003 : Alert

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things on the Finalizer get worse and worse and Hux's stress and anxiety levels are (literally?) through the roof.  
> If only there was a way for him to find peace, to fall into a dreamless, quiet night's sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is where things get slightly graphic

He woke up to an alarm. Listening to the intervals he recognized it as a ship-wide emergency alarm. Ninety-nine out of a hundred times that this happened, it was nothing. A malfunction in 78% of all cases. Minor issues in the remaining percentage. This knowledge (he knew it by heart, having had to explain away complaints about the ship in staff meetings at least once every thirty days) did not mean that he was allowed to stay in bed. As a general, he had to follow protocol. He dragged himself out of bed, faltering a bit on the cold tiles. He stopped in the middle of his room. Why had he stopped? Something had happened here, in this exact spot, he knew that much, but he couldn't even open his eyes, let alone overlook his thoughts clearly. The alarm was rudely blaring over the words and sentences slowly trickling in his head. It was like the sound was blowing them away, scattering them like tree leaves where he couldn't hope to catch them. He shook his head and moved ahead.

"Any clues, officer?"  
"General Hux." The lower-tier, quiet officer who usually made his rounds in Hux's part of the staff quarters stopped in his tracks when he realized who had addressed him. "Unfortunately not, Sir. Except that there seems to be something in the recently damaged zone that ticked it off."  
"Who told you that?"  
"I heard it through the intercom."  
Hux mumbled something in the man's direction and ran off in the direction of the bridge. The cranes. They kept returning to him, their glossy surface, their bright orange color. He hated glossy. He hated orange. Both gave him a migraine.

When he arrived at the bridge he found it was in disarray. Half-asleep quartermasters bumping into hysterical ensigns. Droids falling over themselves to give reports nobody needed. And like a bow on top of a shipwreck, the alarm was still unrelenting, screaming out the ship's discomfort. It felt like a personal attack.   
"Can somebody PLEASE shut off that alarm?" was the first thing Hux yelled when he walked through the doorway.  
"When we know what caused it to go off, General, sure," a helmsman noted dryly. Hux glared at her. She was acting mighty uppity lately. He would ask for her demotion when he got round to it.  
"Do it now. Override it. We're waking up the entire ship and I CAN'T THINK!"  
"Yes, Sir," an electricity technician responded from his corner and started typing away.   
"I have the repairs unit chief on the line right now, General," one of the communication officers said. "Would you like to talk to her?"  
"Put her on speaker," Hux said, so impatient he made gestures. He never gestured when he spoke.  
"General?" a voice boomed through the bridge. The alarm stopped, leaving the bridge dead quiet. Hux heard himself breathe. He didn't like that sound, either.  
"Yes. What can you report?"  
"It was one of the cranes, General," the chief started. Hux's heart sank so deep inside his body he was sure he would never get it back again. He already knew. There was no need to continue. "Not the regular ones. One of the new ones we could borrow from the Starkiller core construction."  
"Yes?"   
"They are much heavier than standard issue cranes and the handling is different. One of my staff has requested the manuals immediately after we heard the news that the cranes would be redirected here but we never got them. When asked, we were told to make haste. We tried and we did okay for the first couple of hours, until we bumped into something that might have set off the alarm. The problem is we cannot reach underneath it."  
"Figure it out, then."  
The chief was silent for a second. Just long enough for her disdain to properly show itself. Not just hers, either. Hux felt all of the eyes on the bridge on him, and they were not favorable. "Yes, General."  
"Over and out." Hux turned to the electricity technician. "Thank you."

Ignoring everyone else, he turned around and walked off the bridge. He wished he was dead. After all, looking at it rationally, what did he have left to offer to the Order? His choir of critics raised their voices. He braced himself for the incoming crescendo.  
 _Anyone else would do better_ , his father's voice scolded him. Yes, Hux thought, I already know that.  
 _You are a stain to this organization_ , Snoke said, his voice full of its usual vitriol. Obviously, Hux agreed.  
 _Loser_ , Kylo said. Hux halted his steps and stood in a deserted hallway, motionless. The ship hummed. It buzzed behind the walls, where miles and miles of cables and vents were hidden from sight. He didn't have a spare moment to rest, but he found he could not force his legs to go on. He knew he wasn't losing his mind- in fact, for a severely sleep-deprived, overworked useful idiot his thinking was relatively clear to him. He was fine, disregarding the cluster of disasters wherever he went. There was something else. There was something here. 

The big problem with assessing your own state of mind is, of course, that your assessment also exists within your mind. There is absolutely no way of knowing if you are a rational, level-headed person. Hux had undergone many mental capacity and psychology tests during his training and recruitment. All results had been fine. Remarkable, even. With a small annotation in the "stress" column. Nothing to worry about.   
Still, Hux was unsure. He could not be sure. Certainty in matters like these was practically impossible. Hux did not know what had come first; if the two things were even related, and if they were, if they were causally related; but when he had heard Kylo's voice in his head, he had felt something. What it was he could not determine. It had been similar to a hand in his hair. It made him feel silly but he turned around. There was nobody there. He checked the ceilings. Everything looked as it was supposed to look. No open vents, no cracks in the panes. No signs of sabotage, like in some other parts of the warship. He was alone in an empty space. Then why did it feel like he was not? Struggling to define what 'feeling alone' even meant, how it felt, specifically, he got annoyed at his idling around. Without measurable aspects there was no answer to this question. He picked up the pace again and walked on.

Staff finally managed to move the crane in the afternoon. It had taken a large group of engineers, as well as regular staff, hours to find out what to do. During the meeting on the incident their superiors explained that nothing more could have been expected from them. The Order might have the best technical professionals in this part of the galaxy, today’s situation had been an outlier; something like this was just not expected to happen.  
“This kind of crane was not built for use inside of a ship,” the site supervisor detailed in one of his never-ending essays. Hux was trying his absolute hardest not to yawn.  
“It has been transported here so it can obviously be on board of a much weaker and less advanced cargo ship,” he interjected dryly.  
“Yes, well, obviously. But, General Hux, if you would allow me to make an observation I am sure the entire table is well aware of…” he looked around, making eye contact with his audience. “We are living aboard a highly advanced warcraft. With all due respect, General, it is not a planet, it is not an industrial facility. There is much more functional equipment here than on Starkiller Base. There is much more that can be destroyed. Sensors are more fine-tuned, and if something does go wrong, like it did this morning, we are in more trouble than we would have ever found ourselves in on the Base, in the same situation.”  
Hux’s awareness drifted through the room, away from the words that were spoken. They were floating somewhere, somewhere he might go back to later, to hold them in his hands and give them all the attention they were entitled to. He just couldn’t do it now.   
“If we had had the emergency tools that are found in every section of the Starkiller Base…”  
“Chief. Tell me. What is required to fix the damages?”  
The supervisor seemed thrown off by Hux’s question. He had been in the middle of a composed argument and needed a moment to refocus.  
“The damages…” he looked over to the other side of the table. “Section Manager Douma. I believe you have the figures with you?”  
“I do, Chief. Thank you. General Hux,” the cloaked figure listening to the name ‘Douma’ took over the presentation on the screen and started going over every piece of damaged material. Hux sighed, trying not to make much noise. He wasn’t interested in the details. All he knew was that it was a lot. A whole lot. And he could feel that nagging sense in the back of his head that was usually the promise of a new headache. He wished he could close his eyes and just nod off right there and then. Maybe in sleep, he would be able to escape this place and this loop of problems he seemed to perpetually move in. Even if it would be brief. Even if his awakening would entail more trouble than he had right now. He was considering it.

It was because of his train of thought that he did not recognize what was happening when it did. He thought he had actually fallen asleep, was asleep, when he felt a distinct pressure in the palm of his left hand. It started where his thumb began, slowly slid up his hand and his middle finger. In a reflex he shook his hand, as if a bug had been tickling him. The sensation came back. This time, he first felt it on the back of his right hand, brushing the tender skin of his wrist. Disturbed, Hux looked at his hands. He turned them around to see if there was anything that could explain what he had felt. There was nothing.  
“General?”  
He looked up at several pairs of eyes examining him.   
“Yes.”  
“That was the end of our reports.”  
“Right.” He tried to regain his composure, tried to wake himself up by stretching his toes under the table. Now, they expected something from him. Guidance. Orders. He wondered what had happened, what they had been told, to expect anything from a man like him.   
“Send me the reports digitally and I will be back with a strategy within the hour.”  
They were visibly unsatisfied.  
“What do you suggest we do in the meantime?”  
 _Workers should never be idle_ , Snoke’s voice sounded in his mind. _Like a colony of ants, every moving part should be just that- moving. At any given time._  
“Remove the crane. Based on your requirements, I will arrange parts we can use to build other tools with lifting capacity. But we need the crane out of the way, first. And get it back to the Base.”  
“We are not certain it can still be used in that manner.”  
“We will have to try.” Hux nodded decisively, hinting that the meeting was over. The other participants did not question him any further and started to silently collect their stuff even before Hux had formally dismissed them.

The first thing he did after stumbling over his doorstep was check his pills. He was devastated to find the bottle did not hold a single pill. He was not looking forward to the follow-up meeting with the medical officer.   
'DO NOT EXCEED 2 PC / DAY' the vial said in large, red letters. Risks included problems with the heart and central nervous system. A reduced capacity for various tasks such as flying space vessels or operating heavy machinery. Not to be combined with any other medicine. He knew and he did not care. But there was no choice tonight. He was all out of relief.   
He took a large gulp of water from his faucet in the bathroom and moved to the bed. He dropped himself on the mattress. In spite of its rather military qualities (it was not designed for comfort) Hux found it was one of the few objects in his vicinity that he liked. 

If I don't get up now I am never getting up again, he thought after a couple of calm minutes and pulled himself out of bed by his arms. Every movement was a thoughtless motion made by a thing without self-awareness. The shower, the towel. Dental hygiene. Night attire. He remembered how he had used to think these things were important. Procedures and sticking to them had been his forte and his hobby. They had allowed him to get where he was now. What would happen to him if he let loose, just a little, if he made a few slips or lapses in judgement? He knew what happened to staff who were weak and could not find it within themselves to work towards a bigger objective. Applying the various disciplinary procedures to himself was always a bit harder to imagine.   
_You'd better start imagining them_ , his father said. _With the way things are going you'll be on the receiving end soon enough._  
Hux shivered. He felt unpleasant, and cold. Hoping he wasn't coming down with some stupid infection he didn't have time for, he returned to his bed, listening to the fearful beating of his heart. It made the headache worse. After all, the more heartbeats, the more painful throbs in his brains.  
 _Your medicine is the strongest in the known universe_ , he repeated to himself in an attempt to induce a placebo effect as visions of ex-staff and prisoners of war being flogged and beaten flashed before his eyes. _Efficacy has been proven in 99,4% of all cases of insomnia. It makes no difference what causes said insomnia. It induces a natural drowsiness within ten minutes and brings a healing, energizing sleep of at least six hours._  
Hux turned to his side. He heard the screams of one of the prisoners. How long ago had that been? Years, he guessed, but he did not want to linger on the memory. He had been so ear-splitting loud. Much louder than necessary. He pressed his palms to his eyes. _It slows down the heart rate as well as the breath, granting a natural rest_ , he thought to drown out the screams ringing in his head. He couldn't remember the rest of the text. The screams turned into crying, then quiet gasps. Hux pressed his hands to his eyes harder.

"Hux?"  
Hux opened his eyes, looking around in the darkness.  
"Can you hear me?"  
"Yes," Hux said, more or less automatically. He was answering someone who wasn't with him. I am losing my mind, was his immediate conclusion. The lack of panic after reaching that conclusion should have surprised him a bit more. It did not; hardly.   
"Are you alright?"  
"You are not here," Hux whispered. "He is not here."  
"Hux," the low voice interrupted. "I am here. I can see you."  
"Where are you?" Hux threw his blanket aside and got up from the bed. "Show yourself."  
"Some shithole planet, that's where I am."  
Hux did not move and tried to scan his surroundings. He was alone.   
"How do I know it is you?"  
"You don't recognize my voice?"  
"It is possible to emulate someone's voice."  
"I know you. We work together. I know your face. And your first name."  
"Many people do. That doesn't prove anything."  
"Armitage," Ren's voice pronounced the syllables of his full name. "Ar... mi... tage."  
"Stop."  
"Hux, come on. I'm tired, you're tired. You know it's me. I know that you do."  
 _The wish is the thought's origin_ , Hux said to himself. He didn't want to trust this voice or his own senses.   
"This is all nonsense. I'm dreaming."  
"Yeah, I don't think so."   
Hux felt that same sensation again; that hand in his hair. He make a quick movement, trying to dodge it. "Stop that."  
"Hux. You honestly need to relax."  
"What are you doing here?"  
"Oh, you believe me now?"  
Hux did not comment.   
"I'm bored. I'm alone here and I'm not allowed to do anything. I got injured."  
The word 'injured' sent a shock through Hux's entire body. Images of Ren, helpless and pale in his bed at sickbay, back when he had returned from his previous mission, flashed before his eyes. "What happened?"  
"I'm fine. It's nothing."  
Perhaps it was his concern for Ren, or maybe he was so tired he couldn't think straight anymore. In any case, he asked a personal question.  
"Are you lonely there?"  
It was out there before he could stop himself. He didn't quite believe it was really Ren speaking to him, so he might as well throw a rock in the well and see what would happen, right? Or so he tried to reassure himself.  
There was a brief moment of silence. Then, Ren answered: "I'm not having many good conversations, here, if that's what you mean."  
"I didn't know you ever had good conversations."  
"Oh, did you think I was like this with everyone?"  
"You give that impression."  
Silence returned to Hux's quarters. The humming of the ship was audible again. Hux tried to get a grip on what was happening. His mind was still so hazy he could not completely dismiss the idea that all of this was a fabrication. By him or by someone else, he could not say. 

"If it's really you, explain to me how this works. How are you doing this?"  
When the voice returned it was much closer than it had been before. As if Ren was standing right in front of him. It was unsettling.  
"Don't ask so many questions," it said. "I am here. This is something I can do. I’m mostly surprised that you can hear me."  
"You can't expect me to just accept this," Hux protested, feeling stupid, thinking he was yelling into a void. Kylo's response was not really an answer this time. He laid his hands on Hux's shoulders (at least, that is how it felt) and pushed him back towards his bed until he had no choice but to sit down.   
“Sit still,” he muttered at Hux’s uneasy fidgeting.   
“What are you doing?” Hux asked, nervously, slowly leaning into the idea that Ren was here with him, in the same room.  
“Relax,” the voice ordered. It was as useless as demanding a navigation computer to compose an opera. Hux just fidgeted some more.  
“Start with your shoulders,” Ren said. “Lower them.” Soft pressure on his shoulders told Hux he was pushing them down. “Lower. Lower.” Hux tried to follow. His muscles were too sore.  
“Breathe in. No, slowly. Like that.” An invisible hand slid to the tip of his chin, tilting his head up a bit. “Lift.”  
Asking Hux to breathe in a slow and controlled manner was unreasonable. Especially when asked by Kylo Ren. Hux locked the tremble in his heart as far away as he could. He told himself that Ren didn’t know. That he would never know. He closed his eyes and tried to focus.  
“Unclench your jaw.”  
My jaw? Hux thought and turned his attention to his facial muscles. He created some distance between his teeth and immediately felt pressure melting away; pressure he hadn’t even known was there. Hux did not like unnecessary expenses and he definitely did not like it when he was the one making them. Finding out he was carrying this much strain around was uncomfortable to him. He wondered whether others could tell, looking at his face. The idea sent an additional shot of stress and fear through his body.  
“Unclench those fists, too, while you’re at it,” Ren’s voice continued. Hux did as he asked.  
"Try to sit up," Ren instructed him. "Higher."  
"I can't," Hux snapped. "What's it to you?"  
"It will help. You'll feel better. And if you feel better your performance will improve."  
Begrudgingly, Hux stopped his protest.  
"Higher," Ren's voice continued. "Shoulders back. Imagine there's a thread lifting you up."  
Hux had never been the best at imagining things and this sounded like exceptional nonsense.   
"Do it," the voice said. "Trust me."

Hux decided to make one single honest attempt at what Ren was asking. He took a deep breath and tried to hold his head up. He felt the discs of his spine and neck slide into place, one by one, some giving small, satisfying clicks.   
"Feels good, doesn't it?" Ren's voice said, close to his ear. The invisible hands had returned to his shoulders and he now lowered them without effort, using gravity. Regardless of whether they really were Ren's hands they felt like them, to him. They felt like he had expected them to feel on his skin. Warm, big. Strong, but in a quiet and controlled way.   
Somehow, the haze in his head was less thick than it had been when he returned to his quarters. He blinked when it hit him: there was no migraine. Not even a slight ache, nothing. While examining this new state of mind he did not immediately notice the fingertips tracing his neck, gently tugging at his shirt. But when he noticed them they were undeniably at the center of his awareness. They gave him goosebumps and he shuddered. He didn't want Ren to stop. Still, this situation was so far out of the ordinary that he couldn't help himself and asked: "What are you doing?"  
"I'm massaging your shoulders."  
"I know. You know what I mean."  
"No, I don't," Ren's voice said, slowly.   
"What are you doing here?"  
"You looked like you needed it." He sounded unfocused, as if he was dreaming. His hands pulled Hux's left sleeve down and uncovered his shoulder. Hux held his breath. His head moved to its side, more or less outside of his own volition, wanting to give Ren more leeway.  
He heard Ren inhale, hold his breath.

Hux kept still, his breathing shallow, his heart out of control while he let Kylo's hands touch his arms, his neck; let his fingers trace his collarbones, his jaw, his cheekbones, the outer circle of his ears.  
"I want to see you," Ren said after he had completed a couple of rounds like that.   
Hux's mouth felt dry. He still swallowed, nervously. He was aware of Ren's presence here with him, a silent onlooker. It made him feel cold and warm at the same time. Slightly nauseous, even. His skin felt like it was burning as he lifted his shirt over his head and laid it on his bed, next to him.   
“Fuck,” Ren’s voice whispered in the air, accompanying his hands. He was less gentle than before. Hux undressing must have given him confidence. Or he just couldn’t hold back any longer. That was probably it, Hux thought to himself as Kylo’s hands stroked his chest, his stomach, his back, and he leaned backwards a bit to give him access. He closed his eyes, giving in to the hungry pressure of Kylo’s hands. They pushed, they clawed. They drank but even without any visual confirmation, Hux knew that they did not have enough. He had to admit, neither had he. Every inch of his skin Kylo touched was… he did not have words for it. As if it was living and breathing for the first time.   
“Show me more,” Ren’s voice returned after a minute-long silence. Hux could not remember he had ever blushed more heavily in his life. But he did what Ren asked, sliding out of his pants and lying back down, naked on his bed.  
“Relax.”  
“Stop saying that,” Hux hissed, looking to his side, trying to hide his face from Kylo’s gaze. “You keep saying the same thing.”  
“It’s still a valid order.”  
“Well, I can’t do it.” Hux looked where he guessed Kylo’s presence was concentrated, lifting his chin in defiance even in his current position. “You’re going to have to make me.”  
You couldn’t say Kylo did not try. His hands slid underneath Hux’s thighs and moved up to his buttocks, higher, tracing the curve of his back. Kylo’s ethereal strength came in waves, Hux felt; it rose and fell like a slow and steady breath, and when it was at its highest he could have sworn it made his body float. Kylo’s arms lifted him up and pressed him close to him. He could feel him against him now, for a brief moment. Bare skin. He was warm.   
“Touch yourself,” Kylo whispered in his ear. “For me.”  
Hux was surprised at how quickly his defenses were broken. How much he wanted them to be. He was speechless at first and couldn’t move, least of all in the direction Kylo wanted him to. It turned out that all he needed to comply was a little guidance. Kylo took his hand and moved it downward, placing it where he wanted it. That was enough. Hearing Kylo’s breath in his ear become more labored and intense with every involuntary squirm and moan from his side did the rest.  
The room was cold- regulated temperatures had dropped to the nightly settings- but the air between Hux and Kylo’s ghost was warm, almost uncomfortably warm. Kylo had laid his hand to Hux’s chest, holding him still, pressing him to his mattress. Being trapped this way somehow gave Hux even more pleasure and he knew he would not be able to take this much longer. It had been ages ago since he had last done this. He had forgotten how good it was, how good it could be. He already knew he would want it again, sooner rather than later.   
“I want to see you come,” Kylo said. His words made Hux hips jerk. But it wasn’t just what he was saying; it was the tone of his voice.   
“Are you enjoying this?” he asked. He hadn’t expected an answer, least of all an honest answer.  
“Yes,” Kylo gasped, clearly as out of breath as Hux was.  
He took a moment to listen to Kylo’s subdued moaning and found it was the hottest thing he had ever heard in his life. He could try to keep it in all he wanted, he couldn’t hide his desire for him. Hux made sure to pay attention to every sound, so he could recall it later. In case he ever needed it. He put it away, tucked in a secret chamber of his heart, locking it for everyone but himself. It was now his.   
“Oh,” he heard Ren’s ghost sigh when he came, arching his back and gritting his teeth. “Fuck,” he added.  
Compared to Kylo, Hux was quiet and did not say a word as he felt himself slowly sink back down from his high. He felt Kylo’s lips on the soft skin of his neck. There was not a doubt about it: those were his lips, and that was his tongue, and this was a kiss, or at least something similar. Hux closed his eyes, thinking he would only keep them closed for a brief moment. He was vaguely aware of the weight of Kylo’s body resting close beside him. The brief moment turned into a long nap. All of the tension he had been carrying along with him, inside of his muscles, nerves and bones, had evaporated. As a result, he fell asleep in a way so natural and easy he never would have believed he could an hour ago. It was a deep sleep; no dreams. He woke up once during the remainder of the night, noticed it was cold, and crawled underneath his thick blankets, where he slept until his alarm started ringing. His own bedside alarm. Triggering as it was to him, it was a huge difference from the ship’s main alarm from yesterday. He got out of bed and walked to his bathroom, where he washed his face and brushed his teeth.   
His movements were effortless. His thoughts were a blank slate. He was still a bit drowsy and only noticed the darkened spot in his neck when he combed his hair. He inspected it. It was red when he looked at it from one angle, but more purplish from another. It took him a while to pick up his comb again and continue the busywork required for a First Order General’s working day. The idea that last night hadn’t been a dream needed to sink in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That crane... I'm still howling it's so funny to me. Sorry Armie I can't stop torturing you...


	4. 0004 : Ritual

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The ship is different with Kylo's voice in Hux's head. Work is different, everything is different.   
> And while nobody could be aware of what has happened between the two of them, there are some who suspect something is up.

The crane issue dissolved. More or less on its own. Hux did not feel he had made a significant contribution to solving the problem. It just did.   
The gigantic orange thing was successfully lifted from its position, allowing technical staff to make the necessary repairs. Somehow, they had managed to get it shipped back to Starkiller base overnight. Hux’s step was light, as if he was walking on the leaves of aquatic plants floating on the surface of a lake.   
The First Order did not have an internal reward system in place. It had been in the works decades ago. There had been talks of medals of honor. Banquets. And not diplomatic banquets, either, no- purely ceremonial parties to celebrate internal successes and achievements. Hux had not been participating in those talks. If he had been, he would have been highly skeptical of the concept of ‘positive reinforcement’ as a motivational technique, even if he wouldn’t have been able to deny its scientific plausibility. However, it had been decided that the Order would not need rewards until all of its inefficient elements had been purged from it. Needless to say, that day had not yet arrived. But if it had, if Hux had had the knowledge that he was heading an organization in which each part was trustworthy and reliable, he would have been handing out rewards today. To the nightshift workers, to the technicians who had made the correct calculations, to the managers who had not doubted his orders.   
There were more problems, more fires to put out. There always were and there always would be. But that was why he was here, wasn’t it?   
Representatives requested meetings with him. They told him about the problems they faced, the lack of materials, the lack of morale. Hux listened to their woes. He was still tired, vaguely- a distant sense of energy leaving his body, leaking away. Nothing worse than that. Nothing more dramatic than every day of his life since he had been about twelve years old. Today, he was able to hear his staff out and actually think their issues over before giving his subsequent orders. Reports came in throughout the day, informing him about progress. Small steps, but progress nonetheless. A quenched uprising, even, down in the docks. The old stereotype of lawless harbor folk was still true, Hux guessed. He didn’t think about it longer than a minute. It was lunchtime and he was hungry.

Meals were ready-made, packaged and delivered to generals at set times. Exceptions were made in emergencies. There were none of those today.  
Most days, Hux managed to finish each of his three daily meals within ten minutes. They were small, light; with a very high nutritional value. Hux usually didn’t taste any of it. Now that he was hungry, it was a different experience. He found himself actually enjoying the stuff, even if it wasn’t anything haute cuisine. Getting up from his chair to go back to work he realized he hadn’t been worrying about the rest of the day for once.  
Staff looked at him as they walked by. It seemed that way, to him. He wondered if there was something visibly different about him. If they could pinpoint what it was. Where it showed. He had no clue how it would show, himself; he only knew he felt different. His hand wandered to his neck, thoughtlessly. His uniform covered the red spot nicely. He still felt it was there.

“General?”  
Somehow, they had found him, even here. Hux had left the bustle of the bridge for a little while and had removed himself as far from the action as he could without someone missing him. He needed some time alone. He needed more time alone in general, but it had never been more true. It was such a relief to find a hidden spot where he could think freely without being watched. He couldn’t rely on his facial muscles when he thought about what happened. He had learned that much.  
He turned around, trying to make his face look extra serious so they would think he had been pondering something vital to the Order’s operations.   
“Yes?”  
It was a small fry. A messenger, nothing more. He was young, still a kid, Hux guessed; it could be difficult to tell with some lifeforms.   
“General Hux. I have a message from supreme leader Snoke.”  
Hux’s eyes flicked left to right, looking for security cameras, microphones. After all these years he knew better than to underestimate Snoke’s truth finding capabilities. He stopped himself and worked on his posture, instead. If Snoke wanted to spy on him, he would find a way.   
“Tell me what he wants.”  
“To see you, General. He told me that it was no pressing matter but still to inform you.”  
“Understood. Anything else?”  
“No, General.”  
“Good. Dismissed.”  
Hux watched as the kid walked away. There was a strange sway to his step. Probably drafted from one of the more remote colonies. He waited until he had turned a corner and was no longer able to see him. He then hurried to Snoke right away. He knew what ‘no pressing matter’ meant. A heavy feeling spread from his stomach to his throat. With the heavy feeling came the exhaustion. As if it had been there all along, had simply been repressed, hidden underneath his unexpected, temporary bliss. Hux could only hope that the headache wouldn’t follow, the way it normally did.

Funny how he could see his own face, he thought, kneeling down. The tiles reflected him so clearly it was like staring in a dark mirror. They were meticulously clean, as always- Hux had been in charge of directing the ship-side cleaning crew back when he was just starting and remembered giving out orders for two-hour shifts around this part of the vessel. Whoever was calling the shots now was doing a good job. Maybe that was a stretch and all it told him was that the shifts had not changed. Funny, how the first thought in his mind was trust in his fellow man, today. A nagging feeling rose from the soles of his feet, further and further upward until he could no longer ignore it. A familiar feeling that he had been slacking off and things would catch up with him soon enough. Or, in other words: that feeling that had been with him for the majority of his life. A sensation he wasn’t very eager to fall back into.  
He wanted to look up and see what was taking Snoke so long. He suppressed the urge, kept his head down. He could stay in this position much longer than this. He had done it before and he could do it again.   
First Order leaders enjoyed keeping subordinates waiting. Hux knew he did. The trick was to not give them the satisfaction of spotting impatience on your face.   
Absent-minded, his brain formed words, slowly stringing sentences together. They had no set purpose. They were without a target. The direction, however, was Ren.   
_Kylo_ , his mind said, barely paying attention to what it was saying. What it said was simply what naturally came out; silhouettes in a fog. _Where are you? When will you be back? Any free minute to spare?_  
When Ren promptly answered he almost lost his balance. A fraction more to the left and he would have fallen to his side right in the middle of Snoke’s lair.   
_I don’t know_ , Ren’s voice said, loudly, in the center of Hux’s head. _Maybe tonight._ It rang and bounced off the inside of his skull, and left as sudden as it had appeared. It was so strange to hear a voice without any background noise, not a single other sound; no static, no echo- just Ren’s low, dark timbre, concentrated and perfected like a very strong drink. Hux blinked, wide awake again, energy surging through each nerve, each blood vessel.   
“General,” Snoke’s voice boomed through the hall.   
“Supreme leader Snoke.”  
Hux looked up. Snoke was hidden in shadows. Not sure if he was even looking his leader in his eyes he continued staring into the darkness. Seconds passed. They turned into minutes, and finally into a gooey pile of time impossible to recollect or decipher from a distance. When Snoke finally spoke Hux understood why he had waited for so long.   
“You are different.”  
Hux thought it wise not to respond at all, not with words, not with facial expressions. He kept looking in the same direction, hoping he looked like a statue. Snoke could try to read him all he wanted. And he knew he did, he could feel his eyes on him. As the uncomfortable silence dragged on he was certain that the security guards were now also looking at him. All forty of them, visible and invisible.  
“I will give you a chance,” Snoke said, “just one chance to come clean about whatever it is that is ailing you. It would help you, later, if you would speak now.”  
“I would, if I knew what you meant, Supreme Leader.”  
“You don’t have _anything_ to say about… the colonies? The deals you have made about the additional forced laborers?”  
“I shall admit, my decisions left things to be desired. I vow to do better and keep the needs of the First Order in the forefront of my thoughts next time.”  
“You are walking a dangerous path, General Hux.”  
“I will do whatever you say, Supreme Leader. If you think it would improve my performance in any way, please, whatever you suggest.”  
Snoke did not say anything after that. There was a gesture, only faintly visible in the dark, telling Hux to get out of his sight. Hux did not wait for the guards to escort him out. He got up and walked away.

He waited until late in the evening to retreat to his rooms. Not wanting to give anyone the idea that he was avoiding his responsibilities he diligently worked two and a half hours of overtime; a bit longer than usual, but not so much that it was a noticeable outlier. He noticed his legs were in more of a hurry than he was willing to show. He had to make an effort not to run. It was difficult when every hallway seemed to last an hour.   
When he finally locked the doors behind him he was quick to turn the windows to opaque. He moved to his bathroom and locked that door, as well. He dimmed the lights until there was just enough to see where he was. He slid down to the cold floor, his back pressed to the wall furthest from the door. That was as far as his preparations could go. He was ready.   
“Ren?” he said.

Against his better judgement, he stayed awake. He remained in his designated hiding place, his back turning as cold as the wall he was leaning against, his legs turning numb. With irregular intervals, he called for Ren. Just to let him know he was here. In the end he decided that even if there was no answer, it was enough to know that Ren was aware he was waiting for him. It was a downgrade from talking to him, without a doubt, but it was enough for him that he was in Ren’s head. Wherever he was. Hux knew that he could hear him.   
He got up and dropped his clothes on the floor. His adrenaline wouldn’t let him relax, and if he wouldn’t be able to fall asleep for a while he might as well take his daily shower, even if he was very late. When he tumbled in his bed he actively closed his eyes. It didn’t make much of a difference since he saw visions of Ren whether his eyes were open or closed.   
“Ren,” he tried again, for the last time.   
He felt like an off-course satellite. Fallen out of orbit, out of reach.

 _Hux_.  
“Ren?”  
 _Yes._  
His voice sounded different, subdued, soft. Hux figured he wasn’t free to talk and he had to keep it short.  
“Are you okay?” he asked. The only response he got was a hand in his hair. His mind wasn’t playing tricks on him- Kylo was on his left side, so near him; he was warm, he could feel it. He moved towards him, acting on instincts he hadn’t known existed within himself. He gave himself a pause, just a moment, before his next question.  
“Does Snoke know?” _  
No_ , Kylo said. He was so close Hux felt his breath to his skin, and the tip of his nose, softly pressing against his. _No one knows. No one.  
_ “Can he hear what we say?”  
 _No. He thinks he knows, but he’s wrong._  
There was a barely audible chuckle.  
 _He can’t figure you out._  
“Me? Snoke can’t figure me out?”  
 _Hell no. He’s clueless._  
Hux wanted to know more. He lost his train of thought, though, because Kylo’s hands were still in his hair, stroking his scalp, his neck, his shoulders. He closed his eyes as to feel more of it and that technique worked. For a minute there was nothing else. Just Kylo’s invisible ghost hands, big and warm and strong, caressing him as if… as if he was someone else, someone very different from who he was. He reached out to him, to where he thought Kylo was. He felt the outlines of his face and traced them with his fingers, slowly. His brain struggled to connect what he felt with an image. But it was him. It was definitely him.  
 _Can I stay here for a while?_  
“Yes.”  
 _Oh, okay. That was a lightning-quick response.  
_ “I could’ve refused.”  
 _You wouldn’t.  
_ Kylo’s fingertips slid down Hux’s skin. He laughed a bit when he gave his earlobe a pull in a playful manner Hux did not understand.   
_I can feel what you want._  
“You don’t know what I want.”  
 _Sure, General. So I cannot read your mind. I am free to make a guess, though, am I not?_  
Hux squirmed when Kylo touched him. He understood his own body even less than he understood Ren. He wished he had more control over it. That it obeyed him like his other possessions. Like his subordinates.   
_You’ve been waiting for this all day, haven’t you?_ Kylo breathed. He made getting Hux out of his clothes look easy. _Do it._  
Hux looked the other way, at the ceiling, willing and unwilling to give in at the same time.   
_Come on. I know you want to do it. I know you’ve been thinking of nothing else…_  
“Hold me down.”  
Kylo stopped. _What?  
_ “Hold me down. Push me to the bed.”  
Kylo seemed to consider the idea for a moment. He then did what he was asked to do. Hux closed his eyes when he felt his weight on his legs and his hands pinning his shoulders to the mattress.   
“Now I can do what you ask.”  
Kylo didn’t say much after that. Hux asked him to push harder. Kylo made a sound in response.  
“Harder!” he insisted. Kylo obeyed.  
When he said “Good,” Kylo clasped his throat and moved so close to Hux he could feel his breath to his face.   
_What are you doing to me_ , Ren’s ghost voice pondered. It wasn’t really a question. There was pain hidden in his words, pain and regret, in the way he spoke them. An involuntary coming to terms with something he had not been prepared for. Something he had not been looking for but had just happened to him, had fallen down on him like a sudden thunderstorm in wat had looked like a calm summer’s day.   
Incidentally, this was all Hux wanted to hear. It made his head spin to hear this specific type of lament out of Kylo’s mouth. That initial shock after you realize you have made the wrong move on a chess board. The ground shaking underneath your feet after opening Pandora’s box, and the consecutive sadness and guilt rising up until they drown you.  
He had him. He knew it. Even now, underneath him. Even now, with his immaterial hand around his neck. There was a ton of strength in that hand alone- but the way it trembled told Hux all he needed to know.   
He lost himself in this- whatever this was, a ritual? Could something that had only happened twice be called a ritual? There was no guarantee that it would ever happen again. Hux had always had trouble with getting the most out of something. He never really managed to enjoy something, be it a rare sighting of a comet, the luxurious food at a banquet, or a short-lived success in his role as general. Those moments passed him as if he hadn’t taken an active part in them and before he knew it, they were gone without him taking more than a glance at them, a raised eyebrow, a half-smile. This, however… this was easy. Everything else ceased to exist when Kylo touched him. Like a magic spell forcing him to undergo it, to welcome anything Kylo wanted to do to him. How it happened, he could not figure out. Maybe he would try to rationalize it, later, one day. If an entity like Kylo Ren could be rationalized at all. _  
_With his loss of control came a loss of shame. He knew he was making sounds, along with Kylo- both subdued, trying their best to be quiet- and he knew that he would never have allowed himself this kind of indiscretion with anybody else. Never. Hux did not show how he felt, physically. Not pain, at least, and until yesterday he couldn’t even have imagined himself to groan like this from pleasure. Normally, he would have hated his own instincts as they reminded him of weakness, an incurable weakness of the body and mind he so often despised in others. There was no use holding back, though; in fact, he didn’t want to hold back when Kylo didn’t. He eagerly stocked the shelves in his library of helpless Kylo moans. He didn’t have to tell him, he knew that he was close. He heard his voice, louder than before, rise up and grow larger than just the voice inside of his head. Seeing Hux come was apparently still too much for him to take. Kylo yelled out loud, immediately trying, but failing, to correct himself.  
 _Hux_ , he heard him say, struggling to catch his breath.   
“Ren,” Hux answered, a small smile on his face. “Did they hear you?”  
 _Fuck, maybe. I don’t know._  
His hand released Hux’s neck and stroked his hair. Kylo pressed his forehead to the back of Hux’s head. His breath was warmer than before.  
 _What am I going to do? What are we going to do when I get back there?_  
Hux left Kylo’s questions unanswered. An index finger was drawing small circles on his back. It sent him into a slow, drowsy state he did not want to wake up from.  
 _I don’t know if I can keep my hands off of you._  
“Practice self-control.”  
 _Easy for you._  
“It won’t hurt to try.”  
  
Both of them went quiet, descending further into themselves. They were warm, together, and Hux did not need his blanket with Kylo right behind him, holding him in his arms. It wouldn’t be much different if he had actually been here, Hux thought, trying to imagine what it would have been like if he could have seen his face. And even after all that had just happened he felt his cheeks turn red at the thought of Kylo’s face up close, of Kylo’s eyes on him, of Kylo’s lips on his.

 _Hey. Hux?_ Kylo’s voice whispered to him, waking him from his near-sleep.   
“What is it?”  
 _I… I wanted to tell you something._  
An element in his voice made Hux’s drowsiness disappear in an instant. A hint of hesitation, of shyness- something so far removed from Kylo’s usual demeanor that it stood out to him.  
“Go ahead.”  
He didn’t. all that followed was silence.  
“Kylo?”  
 _Sorry. I, um…_ \- Hux imagined him nervously combing his thick hair back with his fingers, here – _I’m not sure where to begin._  
“So, what’s it about?”  
 _You._  
His heart was beating fast and his throat felt dry, and strangely swollen. There were so many options here, so many possibilities, and each of them sent his nerves in overdrive. It was an unfamiliar kind of nervosa. It wasn’t too unpleasant. Waiting for Kylo to continue, he listened to the background noise surrounding them. His old pocket watch ticked. The ship hummed. The planets turned. Turned in an endless debris that led nowhere. Just like he did, himself. Hux was well aware. Everything was void of meaning and the universe was emptiness, materialized. Not much had changed, except for Kylo latching on to him. He now had a temporary partner- a fellow passenger on the seat next to him. And while it was still an exercise in futility at least it was comforting to know he was not the only one travelling into darkness.  
  
Wanting to give Kylo the time he needed, he waited patiently. When he felt a heavy, nauseating loneliness creep up on him he knew it was too late. He was alone.   
He didn’t bother to look around and pulled his blanket up to his chin. Kylo had left and there was no way for him to contact him from here. Tired as he was, sleep did not come for a while. Hux found himself thinking something might have happened, that it hadn’t been shyness preventing Kylo from speaking his mind, and if something had happened, well, then he was worried.   
He turned to his right side, then to his left. Maybe Kylo’s resting quarters- his tent in whatever forsaken desert he was currently at- had been disturbed. Maybe he had been called off because his services with his lightsaber were needed. Or maybe he had been ambushed.   
Maybe breathing exercises would help. Hux sighed. His back was cold now, without Kylo pressed against it. And where he had been comfortable before he was now twisting and turning to no avail. He was worried. He was worried and he didn’t like it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> By the way- this whole story is my response to the concept of force conversations.  
> The moment I saw this happen I knew I had to do something with it, because this kind of connection is everything I wanted when I was a hopelessly romantic teenager. Wouldn't it be the greatest thing to be able to talk to someone in secret, just using your minds? Whew. I love it.


	5. 0005 : Symmetry

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Commander Ren makes a dramatic return to the Finalizer. Hux, shaken enough as it is, has to be the one to meet him in the docks.  
> Being on the same ship after all that has happened between them - somewhere, in a surreal, hallucinatory universe - is making his head spin.

The ship was a pandemonium when he emerged from his quarters. Early, once again; woken up by his own blaring alarms. That was not all, though: even through his noise-cancelling doors he could hear shouting in the hallways. Some shouts sounded suspiciously like his name. He ignored them. His morning routine came first, today.   
A sense of responsibility and consciousness of his duties returned to him once he was in his uniform, inspecting it for dust particles and stains in the mirror. It quickly turned into a slight panic when he saw how late he really was. His delay was running in the minutes. Rushing his shave, his dental hygiene and his hair he prepared for the day, running for the door.  
“General Hux!”  
He stared in four pairs of eyes. There was an entire collective in front of his door.  
“What is the matter, officer?” he directed his attention to the most senior staff member.  
Visibly relieved that she was finally able to communicate her urgent message, she said: “Commander Ren has returned this morning, General.”  
A pang in his stomach, a tremble in his knees. That was all. He managed to keep the physical reaction to a minimum.  
“There is no escort party prepared for him. Are you free to escort Commander Ren today, General?”  
Hux wanted to inquire why nothing had been prepared but quickly realized that Ren’s return must have been too unexpected for them to act in advance.  
“What happened? Why are they back so soon?”  
The officer nervously looked at her colleagues. “We do not know, General. We have no other intel as of now.”  
Hux checked all of their faces. All blank expressions. One of them shrugged. He guessed there really was no foul play here. They had no idea.   
“Very well, I am on my way. Dismissed.”  
  
His legs carried him where he needed to be. Taking advantage of his intimate knowledge of this ship Hux took shortcuts. Taking advantage of his status on the career ladder he pushed others out of his way, taking the elevator they had been waiting in line for.   
He met Captain Phasma in the hallway leading up to the docks.  
“Good afternoon, General,” she said.  
Hux nodded, not in the mood to come up with something better. That part of himself was inaccessible, drowned out by his internal voices, louder and louder, accompanied by his boots as they made rhythmic steps on the floor.   
“What happened?”  
“From what I gathered, there was an attack. Commander Ren got injured. The whole party was forced to retreat.” Phasma looked straight ahead. “Forty-two casualties. Ninety-nine injured, including Ren.”  
“Has this been reported to Supreme Leader Snoke?”  
He was never entirely sure of it but Hux often believed Phasma was laughing at him, under her breath, just out of his ear’s reach. It was quiet enough that he would never be able to prove that she did, but he was sure that thousands of stormtroopers would immediately agree with him if he ever asked them about it. She did it again, what seemed to be a chuckle full of vitriol and schadenfreude, before she said: “I think that honor suits you best, General.”  
There was nothing he could say. She was correct.  
  
It was a good thing, in the end, that he had had no time to prepare, no time to stress beforehand. His body went through the motions with no excess thoughts. When the ship came into view there wasn’t much on his mind except what had happened to Ren.   
“It’s intact,” he mumbled.  
Phasma picked up on his words. “They managed to get out in time. The inhabitants’ civilization is not advanced enough for space defenses. I believe they don’t even have satellites.”  
“Hm.”  
“Still, forty-two casualties is impressive for a society that backward,” Phasma continued. “This would not have happened with a meticulously prepared security system in place, in my opinion.”  
“We don’t know what happened, yet.”  
“So we will start our investigations right away.” She looked in Hux’s direction. “Won’t we, General?”  
Distracted by the heavy doors of the ship opening, Hux upped his tempo and muttered an absent-minded “Yes, yes, of course,” back to Phasma. Trying not to peek at what was behind the doors, he peeked. Trying not to draw any attention to himself, he noticed some stormtroopers defying their orders to keep their eyes on an imaginary point right in front of them, turning their heads. He couldn’t stop. He had to know. Tiny little shocks went through him, up and down, when he thought he saw a reflection of a red, fiery light; a hint of a black cape, of black hair. His eyes weren’t fooling him, not this time.   
“Commander,” he said, at the top of his voice, and he wasn’t even within the recommended twenty foot range for addressing superiors yet. The metal door landed on the dock floor with a booming sound as stormtroopers flooded out, surrounding their overlord, protecting him with their bodies.   
He looked battered. To Hux’s relief, he walked just fine, but the dried blood on his face and the bandages around his arm and his chest alarmed him. They looked haphazard, makeshift- and of course that was to be expected when the troops had had to flee the battleground in a hurry. First aid was, sometimes, the only thing a soldier could offer. Still, it was inexcusable to Hux, emotionally, and he angrily pushed stormtroopers out of his way, trying to get to Ren.  
“Commander!”  
His was a glance from underneath dark lashes, his was a silence. As if Ren didn’t know him. That was nothing new. It had never been any other way. Was it wrong of Hux to expect something to be different? Probably. He didn’t even know what he had expected.   
He turned around and paced after Ren. Keeping up with him wasn’t easy, even now. They passed Phasma, who gave Ren an amicable slap on his uninjured shoulder.  
“He’s a tough guy,” she told Hux in passing. “He’ll pull through.”  
Hux mumbled something, cursing the bright lights in the docks and cursing the endless pairs of eyes behind stormtrooper helmets as he felt his face turn red. The one comforting thought he could muster was that Phasma had extraordinary skills in reading people. He could only hope they were so extraordinary they were exclusive to her.  
Leaving her behind to deal with the troops, Ren and Hux soon found themselves in a hallway, as they had so many times before.   
“Commander Ren,” Hux tried to keep his voice as normal as he possibly could.  
Ren stubbornly walked onwards in a steady, angry pace. He held his helmet in his hand, clasping it. It looked small in his large glove.  
Hux swallowed. “Are you alright, commander?”  
When there was, again, no answer, he decided to keep it practical. “Where are we headed?”  
“Sick bay,” Kylo grunted at him.  
“Of course.”  
“What do you mean, ‘of course’?”  
Hux looked to his side, lifting an eyebrow.  
“Do not imply that I am weak. I am injured but I can still kill more people than you.”  
“Let me rephrase that, commander. ‘As you wish’. More to your liking?”  
“Hmpf.”  
Hux spent a confusing couple of minutes walking next to Kylo, trying not to look. Trying to ignore his scent, now that he was so near him. There was an earthy tone to it, of dry sand right after a heavy rain shower. There was sweat, obviously. And a speck of dried blood and burnt flesh. It was overwhelming to him. Memories engulfed him from time to time, like a dream; small fragments, lasting only fractions of seconds. He had been in his arms. Maybe it was just because it had all been a new experience to Hux, but the feeling of Kylo’s embrace was fresh and crisp; unforgettable. It made the dissonance between yesterday night and now even more stark. That same dissonance made him look, time and time again, against his better judgement, at the man walking to his side. The disheveled strands of ink black hair. His lips, darker than he remembered them- maybe somebody had hit him? A wave of sympathy rose in his chest, a wave wanting to comfort Kylo, to cover him, to be close. It was so strong it almost prevented Hux from noticing a few interesting things.  
For one, his hands were trembling. Exhaustion? But his step never swayed and his breath was inaudible. Secondly, he avoided Hux’s eyes as though they could paralyze him, but Hux could feel he was still looking his way when he knew it was safe.   
They locked eyes, just once, just for a moment, when they arrived at sick bay, standing in front of the door. Kylo’s eyes were big, and dark, and round. Hux did not know how to describe it. What was behind them. What they were asking of him. That they were asking something, however, was evident. Hux rang the bell and took a step backwards.  
“Good luck, commander, and get well soon.”  
Kylo’s big eyes followed him as he turned around and walked away. Sick bay was very far from where he was supposed to be right now and he had no moment to spare. _The most pressing job of today is complete_ , he told himself. _You did well. And it’s only morning.  
_ He hid in a washroom after passing a corner, holding his hands to his face once he was sure the door was locked and there was nobody there to spy on him, be it physically or electronically. He stayed in that position for a brief while. Then, he rearranged his belt, his sleeves, his gloves, and walked back to the command center.

Back on the bridge, many things demanded his attention. Rebellions, again; that damned vermin from their dirty, backwater planets couldn’t seem to keep their opinions to themselves.   
“Find out who their leaders are.”  
“Well, General, that is precisely our challenge, here…” The low-tier officer chuckled to himself as if it was funny. He looks like a mouse, Hux thought. An insignificant, disgusting and disease-riddled rodent.  
“…they are covering for each other. They _all_ claim to be the leader. I believe what they are going for is a, um…” He made a face, as to illustrate the ridiculousness of it all. Hux did not respond and he continued: “… a democratic system.”  
“Then pick ten of them, at random. They see themselves as equals, don’t they? Give them their democracy, I say. Make an example out of them. Public flogging should help.”  
Hux looked around. There were more officers waiting for orders, standing neatly in line. “Next?”  
“Yes, excuse me, excuse me,” a young, tall technician scuffled forward, too shy to look Hux in his eyes. “Ensign Pebb, General, at your service. I, um, I am experiencing some issues with, eh, the connectivity. With, ehm, one of the Starkiller Base mobile towers…”  
Not quite understanding why this minor issue had to be solved by him, at first, the reason soon became clear to him: the towers were under attack by frequent sabotage efforts. It was all connected, Hux feared, all of it: uprisings, sabotage, democracy.  
“General,” someone said.  
The young ensign stopped in the middle of his story, looking at something behind Hux. It was Phasma.  
“Commander Ren has been called to see the Supreme Leader,” she mumbled near Hux’s ear.   
“Alone?”  
“Yes. You were not invited this time. Sounds like the reporting is now only coming from him.” She lowered her voice even further. “I would make sure that Snoke hears what you have to say about the whole endeavor, too, General.”  
Last month, perhaps, Hux would have been disturbed to hear this. He would have done anything in his power to make sure Ren would no longer be a threat to his reputation. Now, he was just lethargic about it all. Would it matter if Ren managed to get Hux demoted, kicked out of the First Order? It would, but… it would be personal. It wouldn’t have anything to do with Hux’s performance. He might try to spin it that way but they both knew better than that. That little fact made the idea on itself more bearable.  
  
The idea that it may not be a setup at all came to Hux rather late. It was evening, it had been busy all day and he was sensing that all too familiar exhaustion get closer and closer. He took a pill even though he knew better, knew that he would have trouble falling asleep and that short-term solutions were not recommendable.   
“General, could I have a minute?”   
Hux rolled his eyes when he followed the senior officer to whatever it was he wanted to show him; a broken droid, an emergency in the engine room, another uprising?   
“You are probably aware of the situation in Section 17-94, so I won’t repeat old news,” he said while Hux pained his grey matter for a reminder of what the hell was going on in the Starkiller Base Section 17-94. The harder he tried, the more noticeable the throbs in his skull became. He frowned and squinted his eyes before he remembered he needed to keep his composure at all times. He looked ahead and saw Ren was there, walking towards him. Probably on his way to his quarters from Snoke’s lair. The route made sense.   
Keeping the same control over his shock as he had over his headache he met his eyes. They were still big, still round, still dark; perhaps a bit reddened, now. They struck him in their sheer intensity. They reminded him of the eyes of starved forced laborers in a colony he had visited, once. The memory made him realize, with a shock, that it was hunger; a physical deprivation that made Ren look at him like he did. And he wasn’t eyeing a filling meal or a fresh glass of water. He was looking at _him_.   
“Commander Ren,” the senior officer saluted Ren.   
Hux just nodded as Kylo passed him. There was no nod from his side. There was no unspoken message ringing in his head, either. Hux believed he felt his hand brush his arm but it might have been imagination. He fought the urge to look over his shoulder, to see him again, to see more of him. He realized the officer was talking to him when he had to repeat himself.  
“General Hux?”  
“Yes, my apologies. What were you saying?”  
“The Starkiller core. The upcoming replacements for the bearings on the left wing?”  
“Ah, yes. Of course. You have the drawings ready?”  
“That is where I am taking you, General.”  
To Hux’s relief, he looked pleased with himself and eager to show Hux what his team of engineers had been working on. Technical drawings, surely; a scale model, likely. He didn’t seem to notice the destructive, raging storm inside of the man walking next to him. This was testament to Hux’s decades of experience in self-control. His hands rested gently on his back. His face was the same as it always was. Slightly agitated, but no more. A stranger could assign it to his dedication to his job. He kept his pace steady and his breathing calm. He even found some use in the techniques Kylo had taught him that first night and relaxed his jaw. It made his appearance more convincing. It turned his insides to even more or a wreck.  
  
The pills never disappointed. The single unit he had taken was still keeping him awake, hours later. Hux lingered in his chair, postponing going to bed. He already knew he was just going to lay there, motionless, waiting for unconsciousness that would not come. If that was to happen, he preferred staying here for a bit longer.   
This week’s reports on the Starkiller Base upgrades rested on his knee, opened on page two. Hux used to read the weekly updates meticulously. He used to make dozens of annotations in red ink, driving the responsible technicians mad. Better safe than sorry; better a superfluous check-up than a missed construction flaw. When it came to his dearest project no work was too tiring for Hux, no detail too minor. Tonight, though? It was useless to try to concentrate. A futile attempt to get something meaningful done after a day filled with nonsense. And thoughts of Ren.   
_Kylo_ , he thought.   
How was it, that each time his name popped up in his head, it came from somewhere so far away he felt that he could not reach it, could not reach far enough in the archive drawer to get in to unstuck? So deep down that going down there would disrupt his entire foundation?  
Hux laid his fingertips to his forehead, hoping it would soothe his painful nerves. There was no sign of it working.   
He couldn’t figure out what it was, exactly, that he was thinking about. Kylo, just Kylo, always; but that did not explain it. It wasn’t how he looked- there were fragments, glimpses, but he could never see him in his mind’s eye as he was, complete from head to toes. Maybe… just that he was here, on this same ship. That he existed. That he knew Hux, that he was aware Hux existed alongside of him- it didn’t make sense, but wording it like this made his heart race.   
_Look at me, the way you did today_.  
His fingers tapped his forehead until it started to annoy him, and he got up from his chair. He didn’t want to take a sleeping pill. It was probably time to take one, though.

There was a loud bang on his door.   
He didn’t need to check, he already knew who it was. But he wasn’t ready, he wasn’t okay- how could he face him now?   
With the courage of a man who has given up, who knows he will never be adequately prepared, he opened his door with a push on a button.  
He looked about as tired as Hux felt. His eyes were even redder than they had been this afternoon, partially hidden behind his hair. It looked to be somewhat wet, as if he had returned from his shower not too long ago. Was he allowed to wash himself with his bandages..?   
Hux scanned him for signs of injury, of blood, of pain, but Kylo did not let him. He walked towards him as if he was intending to go right through him. The door slid back into place, quietly. It made a small clicking sound as Kylo crashed into Hux, grabbing hold of his upper arms. Not knowing what to do, Hux froze into place. His instincts whispered to him that he might want to step backwards, to de-escalate. He ignored them. He didn’t want to break contact now that it was established. Kylo was warmer in person than he was as a floating, ethereal presence.   
“You,” Kylo said. His eyes were cast down, as if he couldn’t bear to look at Hux.   
Feeling his worries about Ren overtake him, Hux asked: “What’s wrong?”   
Ren let go of Hux’s right shoulder and grabbed him by his jaw, instead. He wasn’t wearing gloves. His fingers squeezed him so tightly his gums and cheekbones started to hurt and his nails were pressing into Hux’s skin. His grip was too strong. Hux had no hope he would ever be able to wrestle out of the position he was in. And if Kylo Ren was angry, he would not spare him. He was more than able to hurt him and would not hesitate; Hux had seen it often enough. He would simply crush his skull; crumble it like a piece of paper. So, no fight or flight. Just surrender.   
He waited for something to happen, for impact, for pain. But he wasn’t scared. Just serene. He, unlike Ren, was capable of facing him. He was glad that he could look at him, allowing all the bits and pieces of him that had been floating around in his imagination to come together. The blood was gone. A couple of bruises and red marks remained on his face, but they did not look very concerning. Sick bay had done a good job.   
His eyes lingered on Kylo’s lips, full and pink as they were. There was always the excuse that he was simply checking them for bruising.  
“I thought about you all the time,” those lips said.  
Still avoiding his eyes, he continued: “I want to know what you did to me.”  
“What I did to you?”  
“How did you do it?”  
“How did I do what?”  
When Kylo finally looked him in his eyes, there was a hint of sympathy on his face, and a touch of sadness. As if he felt sorry for Hux, for himself. He moved closer, and closer. His hand let go of his jaw and slid around his neck. Hux recognized the feeling of his warm palm, his fingers stroking the tiny hairs in his neck, his chest against his. He moved towards him, wanting more but not knowing how to obtain it. Kylo kissed him on his lips. Hux reached out, clawing his shoulders. It was all so easy from there. He had never been kissed, had never been so close to someone like Kylo, but none of it was a problem. He followed Kylo’s lead and opened his mouth for him, welcoming his hunger. Kylo gave in to it the moment Hux gave permission. Hux could not imagine ever having a better kiss. How simultaneously lucky and sad to have your first partner be the last, the only one, he thought, a drop of melancholy in his heart, a tiny speck of black ink in a sea of warm color. Kylo moved along with him, not against him- as if they were a single entity. He knew what to touch and where to be, effortlessly. He wasn’t gentle. Still, he never hurt him. Not when he grabbed him in his sides, his hands around his ribcage. Not when he bit him in his lower lip. Not when he pulled his head back by his hair to easier suck on the skin on his neck. Not when he lifted him up in the air and carried him to his own bed, like a prisoner, like a hunting trophy.   
Every inch of skin felt like it was burning, electricity running through his veins, tirelessly. Kylo laid his hands on Hux’s chest and moved towards him. They held each other close, desperately tight. Kylo pushed Hux, Hux pushed him back, until they were rolling on Hux’s bed. It wasn’t enough, not to him, not to Kylo. Hux tugged at Kylo’s uniform, his belt, surprised at his own initiative. Kylo smiled, silently. Hux marveled at his eyes- they seemed even darker than before- and at his lips, even thicker, because of him. There was a blush on his cheeks he had never seen there before. He held Hux’s head in his hands, leaning down for another kiss. Hux moved towards him like a drowning man coming up for air, and Kylo’s smile became bigger. When Hux couldn’t figure out Kylo’s clothes, distracted as he was by his lips, his tongue, his weight on his body, Kylo loosened a couple of invisible buttons to help. It was easy, now; Hux’s desire to see him did the rest. Hux paused, quietly looking at the pale, uncovered body of his commander, momentarily unable to do anything else. A big bandage on his side reminded of the damage he had taken while he had been away. And there were some grazes on his arms, some bruises on his hips, still red, still fresh and sensitive. Wanting to take it all away he laid his hands on Kylo’s chest, slowly sliding them down to his stomach. Lower. Lower…   
Kylo sighed and closed his eyes.  
“I want to see you.”  
“You want me to do everything.”  
“What, you want me to get you out of these?”  
“Do it.”  
Hux had never witnessed Kylo follow an order as quickly as he did now. He stripped Hux naked in seconds. Judging by his haste and the way he was all over him, pinching, kissing and biting everywhere, he did not exactly mind Hux giving him orders.  
He hooked his left arm around Hux’s back and lifted him until he sat up, on his knees, chest pressed to Kylo’s. Hux let his hands wander without inhibition. He wanted to feel everything. Now that he had him here, naked and panting, he was going to make the most of it. Even though he was nervous and out of his element. Maybe he could blame his horniness on the drugs he was taking? He himself doubted it. It was difficult to pin the blame on anything but the naked man right in front of him. He made Kylo moan when he touched his cock. He moaned again when he grabbed it, he moaned again when he squeezed it.  
“Hux,” he breathed.  
“Hm?”  
“Can I…?”  
As an answer, Hux took Kylo’s hand and laid it on his erection. He was so hard- had it ever been worse?  
“Oh fuck,” Kylo sighed.   
This was so much better with Kylo’s chest rising and falling in sync with his own, faster and faster; with his moans in his ear. Hux didn’t know what he enjoyed more: Kylo’s tight grip around his cock or the rising desperation in his voice with every jerk of his wrist. It was all blurring together. The ghost who had visited his quarters at night, and his commander. The way he moved his own hand, and the way Kylo’s hand made him feel. Kylo, and himself.  
He was big- it was intimidating and at the same time, it was making Hux shudder with pleasure. It wasn’t just the power trip of finally holding his big dick in his hand. It was the possibilities, too; all of the things he wanted to do to it if he ever got the chance. All of the ways he could use it. All of the things he could do to make Kylo’s breath get short and hastened like it was now, make him thrust his hips forward like he did. He rested his head on Hux’s shoulder, who did the same to him, making them look even more symmetrical. All it reminded Hux of was alien mating rituals he had read about back in school. When he had read those specific chapters he couldn’t help but laugh at them. He had judged it to be a sign of low intellect to waste time on physical relations, had studied it coolly and had gotten the highest grade in his class. It wasn’t for him. And it would never be for him. He had deemed himself better than that, on a higher plane, far removed from sexual behavior: he was not an animal.   
Wrapped in Kylo’s arms he grimaced as he realized he was nothing more than just that. He wanted to make this man come and it was all his dumb under-evolved brains could focus on. He did the job with concentration and devotion. And it worked. Kylo was helpless in his hands. He shouted profanities because Hux made it impossible to stay quiet. He melted into a trembling mess, holding on to Hux as if he were holding on for dear life.   
“Fuck, you are good at that,” he said when he had regained his breath. His skin was sticky, Hux could feel it when he pressed himself tightly against him. Sweat and come, all over his stomach. Hux debated if he would lick it off of him but didn’t get the chance. Kylo’s hand was back, back where he wanted him; gripping him firmly. Not knowing what to do with his hands Hux laid them on his thighs. They were twice the width of his own thighs. Hux’s eyes rolled back and he closed them. Kylo was staring at him, he knew he was, and even without looking he knew exactly how: hypnotizing, hungry, like a predator. Hux basked in it, all of this attention, all of this desire.   
“Breathe,” Kylo hissed a piece of advice. “You need to breathe. Trust me.”  
“Don’t tell me what to do,” Hux snapped back at him.  
“Do it,” Kylo insisted. Hux felt his lips in his neck, on his collarbone; his teeth grazing his shoulder. “For me. Please.”  
Somehow, through the violent waves crashing on him harder and harder, Hux found his breath, some sort of rhythm. Kylo was right. Hux guessed he knew these things better than he did. Feeling his control slip away in an alarming pace he breathed out all that worried him. Kylo made it easy. He believed he even made a bit of noise. Just a bit. A gasp.  
  
“Fuck,” was Kylo’s sole commentary as they slowly returned to reality, lying down on Hux’s bed, wrapped in each other’s arms. They were sweaty and sticky, a sensation Hux would never have tolerated in any other situation. But he was worn out, exhausted; he couldn’t even get out of bed if he wanted to. And he did not want to. He moved his head an inch closer to Ren’s and that was about the exertion he was capable of. Besides, he wanted to stay in Kylo’s scent if he could help it. It was different than it had been back when they had been in training together, after workouts. Sweeter. Thicker, too, harder to get rid of. He felt unclean, undisciplined just thinking it, but he wanted to bathe in it, drench himself in it, wear it.   
  
“You are quiet, General,” Kylo mumbled, his lips brushing his ear.  
“I suppose.”  
“I almost got worried you didn’t like it.”  
“I don’t believe that.”  
“Ha…” Kylo planted kisses on his cheek, his temple. Random spots without a goal. His lips were warm and full. Slightly wet, too. They made Hux shudder, deep inside, undetectable vibrations.  
“Say, General…” Kylo corrected himself: “Armitage?”  
“Yes?”  
When Hux looked up, Kylo was all smiles. That big mouth of his. Eyes squinted into narrow arches. Hux wished he knew how to shake the tingling in his stomach- not that he wanted to get rid of them, just knowing that he could if he wanted to, that would be nice- and achieved nothing.   
“I’ve always wondered how spacious and lavish your refresher is.”  
“I can show you right now.”  
“Big enough for the both of us?”  
“And then some.”  
“Oh, he is spoiled,” Kylo grinned. “Whoa.”  
“What?”  
“You just smiled. Did you know that?”  
“Yeah, so?”  
“It was a small smile. It’s a start, I guess.”  
“You’d better get a move on if you want to try my shower.”  
“Right away, General.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...swoon. I love this ship.


	6. 0006 : Presence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hux and Ren wake up in the same bed for the first time.  
> Kylo convinces Hux to stay with him a bit longer and tells him about something that happened between them the last time he was in sickbay.

Hux knew he was still there before he opened his eyes. The only thing he could compare it to was the sensation when you are certain somebody is with you in a room, but you don’t see anyone. This was different, though. It wasn’t just _a_ presence. It was _his_ presence. There was a blueprint to it, a color, that told him immediately: this is Kylo.  
He peeked through his lashes. There he was, in his bed, no clothes, hair tousled; sleeping next to him with a peacefulness on his face Hux was unsure he himself could ever attain. Apparently, he didn’t even need to be conscious to exert this presence, this aura. Hux knew it was without any logical ground because Kylo hadn’t done anything to be this way, and yet… he was proud of the man next to him. How he radiated power, unknowingly. As if it was nothing. And it was nothing, to him. A magnet attracts metal without intention. Kylo was the same. It was no reason to be proud. Had a planet asked for its gravitational field? Had the only representative of a species asked for their rarity?  
Hux looked at Kylo, feeling his inexplicable, completely useless appreciation for him balloon in his chest until he felt he could burst at any moment.  
He had imagined him near, had willed him to come closer, had whispered his name to himself every quiet moment he had. And here he was. What had Hux planned on doing, anyway, from this point onward? He had no ideas. His mind was empty, silent like a forest in the early hours. Waiting for the sun to rise. For Kylo to wake up.

“Hey,” he said, his voice far away, his head still far in a dream.   
“Good morning.”  
“Armitage,” Kylo said, as if he concluded something after a long consideration.  
“Hm?”  
“Armitage,” he repeated, reached out and pulled him close. Feeling his warmth surround him again was too nice to get uncomfortable, Hux decided. If they could just stay like this a little bit longer, oh, if they could just be exactly where they were for as long as they felt like it… All of the things he was supposed to do today and by the end of the week went through his mind as he felt Kylo’s chest rise and fall. Sending handling instructions for the military cargo that was set to arrive later today. Approving the use of certain functions of the Starkiller core- this would require some extensive reading work. Writing his speech for the address in four days. Drafting a plan to solve the lack of labor supplies; including laborers. Preparing the conference of next week with some important investors.   
He laid his hands to Kylo’s chest, touching his skin in slow strokes. It was still so unfamiliar. He wanted to know everything. He moved from his chest to his stomach, to his spine via his hip bones.  
“Mm, stop,” Kylo sleepily protested. “Stop, you’re getting me hard.”  
“Just from that?” Hux asked, but he already felt it was true.  
“That’s on you,” Kylo smiled. “You do that.”  
Hux was not impressed by his own actions, compared to all the things Kylo was doing to him. Pushing him around, covering him, grabbing him everywhere with his big hands. What did he have to offer compared to him? It puzzled him. Still, he didn’t want to overthink it. Not for as long as his man was still in his bed.   
“Tell me what you want.”  
“I don’t know.”  
“Cause I’m up for anything,” he said, in between sucking each of Hux’s nipples.  
“Anything?”  
He looked up, his cheeks flushed, an amused grin on his face. His lips glistened.  
“Anything you ask. I’m serious.”  
Hux looked to the ceiling, searching for help. The grey synthetic panels did not grant him any comfort. He swallowed. There was no sense in trying to lie to Ren, was there?  
“Could you give me some suggestions? ‘Anything’ is kind of undefined.”  
“You don’t know?” Kylo moved closer to him, even closer, laying his hands on Hux’s cheeks. “I think you do know.”  
 _He’s trying to read me_ , Hux realized and everything inside of him rebelled against it. There was only one way out of this predicament: tell him the truth.  
“Fuck me.”  
Kylo stared into his eyes, in disbelief, searching for signs that would support what he had just heard. Hux met his gaze, not cowering away. He grabbed Kylo’s jaw.  
“Well? What are you waiting for?”  
Kylo didn’t answer. His eyes turned dark, he took a deep breath and flipped Hux around- with just his right arm- until he was flat on his stomach. Hux’s heart was slamming in his chest. Not being able to see Kylo, to scan his face for clues, made him uncomfortable. He had never liked turning his back on others. Because they were not to be trusted.   
He wanted to look over his shoulder. Kylo didn’t let him. He pressed his head down on the mattress and nonchalantly pushed his legs apart. Hux felt his hands grab his butt cheeks, pinching them, moving them around. Testing him like a vehicle, like the controls in a shuttle. He tried to move, forgetting that Ren did not need his hands to hold him down. When he felt his tongue it was a complete surprise. His fingers clawed at his bedsheets, his whole body in shock at how he felt about this. Everything was warm, wet. Tingling. _I want his tongue inside of me_ , he thought, incredulous at how dirty this was, how despicable, and how delicious. Almost immediately after he thought it, it happened. He couldn’t believe, couldn’t mentally grasp how much he enjoyed it.  
“Ah,” he gasped. He thought he heard Kylo go “mm” in response, but wasn’t sure.   
There was no room to move out of the way, no escaping the new, totally unknown feeling of his fingers inside of him. They were wet- had he brought supplies, had he been prepared? Had he known Hux would be up to this? If so, what had given it away? He tried to think, but everything that passed his mind was drowned out by Kylo’s fingers. First, there was just one, but it didn’t stay that way. They moved inside of him, thrusting deeper each time, in a strange rhythm Hux could not resist. He caught himself making sounds, squeaking into his pillow. He was helpless, a feeling that he despised more than anything he had ever known, and all he wanted was more. _Kylo_ , he thought quietly to himself, in silent concentration while Ren pushed himself inside of him. It hurt. That was to be expected and it was nothing Hux could not take. It was just the right amount of pain, the right level of hurt. Enough to really feel it and enough to make him cringe, but not enough to make it agonizing or make him long for unconsciousness. It enhanced his awareness. It put him on edge, sharpened his senses. It was perfect.   
Kylo did not spare Hux’s feelings. He was rough and he was loud. He made sure Hux had nowhere to go. Pinned down underneath him, Hux felt every move he made; even more intensely than he would have, had he been free to leave.   
_Kylo_ , Hux thought. All of his hidden away emotions focused in a single name. All that he had bottled up all his life pronounced in one word. It was almost as if Kylo was hitting him in his core, fucking him the way he did. Hux liked to believe it brought the two of them as close as they could possibly be, even though he knew it was sentimental theorizing. Maybe it was a tiny bit spiritual- with a man like Ren, how couldn’t it be? For the most part, however, Hux couldn’t deny they were both acting on physical instinct and horny selfishness. It felt mind-numbingly good and judging by Ren’s heavy breathing it was at least as good for him.   
_Kylo_ , he thought, realizing that he wasn’t just thinking it, he was saying it out loud, shouting Ren’s name without holding back. Kylo didn’t vocalize, he just moaned. He had heard all of it, though. As they were slowly, slowly floating down from their high, still holding each other close, sweat and heat be damned, Kylo breathed: “Your thoughts are very loud.”  
“At least the patrolling officers in the hallway couldn’t hear them.”  
“They can be very distinct. Sometimes.”  
“That’s nice to know. I think.”  
“Seriously.”  
“What?”  
“Your thoughts are powerful.”  
“Right.” Hux laid his head on Kylo’s chest, finding some comfort. “I’m not sure what that means.”  
Kylo sighed. A peek in his direction showed a small but content smile.  
“Let me tell you a story.”  
Sudden worry came over Hux and he checked his alarms. They revealed the worst scenario he could think of. He was already an hour late to his regular schedule. He wriggled himself out of Kylo’s arms and jumped off the bed, running off to his refresher. When he emerged from there he stumbled back towards the bed, hastily grabbing his uniform out of his closet. Kylo observed him, the same smile still on his face.  
“What are you doing?”  
“I need to get to the bridge. They need me there.”  
“They don’t need you now.”  
“I can assure you that they do.” Hux rummaged through his belongings, looking for his boots. He hadn’t been careful enough yesterday evening. He couldn’t even remember where he had left them when he usually always put them in the exact same spot next to his bed. At the foot. To the left side.   
“They don’t. They’re doing perfectly fine without you this morning. For once.”  
“How do you know? You’re never there…”  
“I can feel it.”  
Hux rolled his eyes. Before he was done rolling them he realized it was likely true, no matter how much he would have liked to deny it, and stopped.   
“You have time.”  
“But what about Snoke?”  
Kylo just shrugged. “What about him?”  
Hux stared at him, not believing what he was hearing. “Doesn’t he know where we are at all times?”  
“You, maybe. Not me. And you’re right here with me. You’d be the safest if you’d stay here.”  
“So he was lying to us?”  
“Of course!” Kylo grinned.   
“He knows something is up. He tried to get it out of me…”  
“I bet that he does. I bet he knows there’s something about you and me. But no more than that.”  
“He thinks I’m jealous, I suppose.”  
“Because that emotion is the closest to his own heart.”  
Hux raised an eyebrow at that.   
“Come here. Remember I said I wanted to tell you something? When I visited you?”  
He came closer, reluctantly. “Yes. What do you want to tell me?”  
“A story.”  
“What’s it about?”  
Kylo pulled his arm, dragging him back into his own bed. “You.”  
It was intriguing. Even self-loathing Hux had to admit that it was. He stepped back into bed, accepting Kylo’s open arms.   
“But we are taking a bath after this.”  
“Of course. And we’ll do the laundry. And a workout. And I’ll make you breakfast. Hm?”  
“We have droids for all of that.”  
“It was a joke.” Kylo shook his head. “Armitage.”  
Hux shivered when he heard Kylo pronounce his name. It was so uncalled for, so disorienting. Nobody called him Armitage in the First Order. Nobody had called him Armitage for years. Trying to mask his discomfort he encouraged him to begin whatever he wanted to say: “Once upon a time.”  
“That’s right. Once upon a time, yours truly was on a mission. A very risky mission. Extremely dangerous. A mission only a man like myself could even hope to complete.”  
“How long ago was this? There have been plenty of those.”  
“Some time ago. I’m not even sure. But I do remember it was in a system with multiple red planets. They were all covered in red dirt. On the way there, some geography expert explained it to my unit but I was half asleep and didn’t catch all of it.   
There was a rebellion there that had almost succeeded in kicking the ruler of the system off his throne. This ruler had been in an alliance with us but it wasn’t worth much. The rebellion had grown far too big in numbers for the government troops to stop. Both sides were weakened by long conflict. Soldiers were wounded, lands were damaged, people were hungry. This was the perfect moment to pay them a visit and kidnap their able-bodied inhabitants, is what they said at the briefing.  
It shouldn’t have been a problem. It sounded easy enough. This mission should have been over in two days. If we could neutralize the rebellion on the first half day we would have enough time to draft everyone who was still alive into the First Order.”  
This all sounded familiar to Hux. He remembered the system with the red planets, vaguely. It had happened about a year ago if he was not mistaken. While he had not been the person in charge he had definitely signed approval documents- even though those meant nothing and the mission would have happened regardless.   
“The problem was that they had fire. A lot of it. They had flamethrowers. They had active volcanoes and they were, I am not making this up, redirecting the streams of lava to trap us. It sounds like I’m making it up, doesn’t it?”  
“I’ve heard crazier stories. Space is largely unknown.”  
“Some generals thought my squadron was making it up.”  
“Are they still alive? Who are they?”  
“They are still alive. But they were demoted.”  
“I could reopen the case and ban them.”  
“I know you could. But that’s not my point here.”  
“Tell me your point.”  
“I was hurt. I guess I thought I could intimidate the rebel troops into submission if I just…” Kylo gestured as if he were swinging a lightsaber around. “If I just ran into them. Thought I was stronger than fire. I was hit, well- I was scorched, actually.”  
He pointed at a dark spot on his side, and another, larger spot on his back. “Medical staff knew what they were doing. But I almost died. They brought me back with an emergency escort shuttle, on my own, in secret. Because they didn’t want the rebels to know I wasn’t there with my troops anymore. As if they wouldn’t notice. You can guess what happened: they noticed and they won. Absolutely destroyed our troops. They got me out in time.   
I arrived here within hours. They didn’t tell many people here what happened, either. They just rushed me into sick bay and kept me drugged so I could stay asleep and give myself a chance to heal. They told Snoke, they told Phasma. They told you.”  
Now he remembered. It was impossible to forget. He thought about it fairly regularly- he had thought about it recently. He remembered a low-rank military guy telling him something had happened to Ren and that he was in sick bay. He remembered trying not to run. The eerily lit, eerily clean hallways of the clinics. All of the bandages. All of the machines they had plugged into the power supply, into Ren’s veins and up his nose, through his throat. How pale he was. Hux remembered he had still possessed an upsetting, ethereal kind of beauty, even then. He had, to him. His long, dark lashes, his motionless hands resting to his sides; the stillness of it all. It humbled him. It made him forget everything else. He didn’t have to fight the urge to send supplementary troops to that backward red planet system and blow it all up. It would be easy for Hux to keep this all a secret. There was no room in his head for anything else but Ren.   
“I was unconscious at first. I started to sense you were there after a week or so. I guess. Time meant nothing, I was in some sort of coma. But later, I knew you were there. There must have been others. There had to have been. Did anyone else come to pay me a visit?”  
“Some of your knights did. And Pryde. I was there with him when he did. He didn’t like it. I insisted.”  
“Smart Armitage,” Kylo laughed, stroking Hux’s arm.  
“It’s common sense.”  
“You’re absolutely right. But I never noticed them. I only noticed you when you were there. And you were there often. It must have been nearly every day. I think you missed one day.”  
He was correct. There had been an emergency meeting that had lasted deep into the evening and when Hux had returned from it, sick bay was closed.  
“I knew you were there because you addressed me. Never out loud. But you talked to me. I didn’t think much of it at the time. Because I couldn’t think about anything. I was just glad to hear a familiar voice. And what you said to me was…”  
He turned to Hux. “Do you remember what you thought?”  
“Not really. Some generic wishing for you to get better, or something?”  
“You were praying.”  
That was ridiculous. “I don’t pray.”  
“I know. But it was practically the same as a prayer. You repeated the same thoughts over and over. Like you were wishing that somebody was listening. That something would grant your wish. And hearing that, well… hearing you, I knew how much you cared. How you were waiting for me.”  
He smiled at Hux, who just felt horrified that Ren had eavesdropped on his most private thoughts and had done so ages ago.  
“No need to be embarrassed. I was grateful. I still am.”  
“No need to be grateful. I did nothing.”  
“Do you know what you thought?”  
Hux looked at his bare feet on his blanket, ten helpless toes wishing they could disappear. He couldn’t even move them.  
“You thought: _Please. I can’t lose him. I would do anything for him._ Over and over.”  
“I don’t understand why you thought it was fine to tap into my brain like that.”  
“Oh, but it wasn’t intentional!”   
“You just happened to read my mind? That’s a thing that happens to you often?”  
“Not often. It happened because I wasn’t fully conscious. I latched onto the first thing I could sense and that was you. I can assure you that I had never read your mind before.”  
“That is noble of you.”  
“Thanks. But I couldn’t read it even if I had wanted to.”  
Hux frowned. “So what’s different with me? What do you think causes it?”  
“I’m not sure how you do it. But I can’t. I tried.”  
“Okay.”  
“You have a wall around you. Every now and then I could catch some little bits and pieces. When you were very tired, or very upset. And sometimes you would think about me. I would hear that.”  
Hux hid his face in his hands. Kylo didn’t let him and moved his hands away, slowly laying them back down on the bed. He looked him in his eyes. In spite of feeling uncomfortable in his gaze (why was it always so intense?) Hux did not break eye contact.  
“It gave me the idea that you might not be the person I had always taken you for. I have to say, you are different than what I expected.”  
“What did you expect, then?”  
“I don’t know. But you are different from what you show people.”  
“What do I show people?”  
“Nothing.” Kylo stroked his arms, lost in thought. “You show them exactly nothing. You come across as an empty shell. Like…”  
“Like a droid.”  
“A droid is not far off.” Kylo gave him a kind smile. “But a droid doesn’t get mad and pop off the way you do.”  
“You’re projecting.”  
“Maybe.”  
 _A droid doesn’t fall in love_ , Hux thought.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It was really lame to me that we never got to hear what it was that Finn wanted to tell Rey in the films. So, I added 'something' Kylo wanted to tell Hux, and then, wouldn't you know it, he TELLS HIM, eventually!   
> Writing this fic was very therapeutic, does it show? Haha.


	7. 0007 : A flat circle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While Hux and Ren have been talking in secret, on their own hidden radio frequency, things have been moving beneath the surface. The First Order's machinations never cease, always bubbling in the background. Hux soon finds out what the Order has in store for Ren. And what it has in store for himself.

“You know I have to go.”  
“I do, but…”  
“No ‘but’, no nothing, Ren. I can’t keep them waiting longer than I already have. Which is… about an hour and a half.”  
“They don’t need you. They’ll manage without you for a day.”  
Hux raised an eyebrow. “A day? You were just talking about a couple of minutes?”  
“It’s different.” Ren’s eyes resembled those of a sad animal begging for attention. Many people would cave. Not Hux. “Now that I have you…”  
“I know what it’s like. And I can get it together. Why can’t you?”  
“Mm, fuck,” was Kylo’s only reaction and Hux did not know what he had said but for some reason, he was all over him. Again. After all this time Hux was still no closer to the bridge, not a step. He would say he minded but he didn’t. He would never refuse him- it felt silly to even entertain the thought. The longer they kissed, the closer Kylo pressed Hux against him. Just as he was contemplating how things had changed, how everything seemed different; how strange it was to realize it wasn’t just physical, it was more than that; and how much more? How much deeper did this go? How long would this last? – there was a loud bang on the door. Hux cowered back from Kylo immediately.  
“It’s okay,” Ren said reassuringly. “Let me deal with them.”  
“Who…”  
“It’s okay.”  
Ren laid his index finger to Hux’s lips and walked over to his front door, opening it with such nonchalance the surprised squad standing on the other side didn’t even say anything when they saw him in General Hux’s quarters.   
“Commander Ren,” one of them blurted out.  
“Commander Ren,” the others repeated sheepishly.  
“You are not looking at Commander Ren,” Kylo grinned. “I am not here. Neither is General Hux.”  
Something happened to their eyes, their gaze. All of a sudden, they just stared at him- not really _at_ him, but right through him, it seemed. All inquisitiveness was gone.   
“Huh?” one of them said.   
“Where is General Hux?” the one with the most senior position asked the other two.  
“I don’t know. Where is he?”  
“You will find him in the docks. He’s doing his 30-day check-up there. If you hurry along you might catch him.”  
Ren leaned out of Hux’s door, watching them as they ran off in the direction of the docks.  
“There. I got them off your back. Should take them a solid while to get there and figure out you’re not there anymore.”  
“Right. I’ll be at the bridge, then.”  
“Just tell me when you’re back here.”  
“Um, okay.”  
“I’ll stop by. If you want me to.”  
“I’ll let you know.”  
“Thank you.”  
The hunger had returned to his eyes. The prospect of letting Hux return to his everyday duties was close to unacceptable to Ren. He let him go because Hux wanted him to- that was the only reason that was good enough. Hux walked out his door, keeping his face expressionless and his pace impeccable. On the inside, though, he was euphoric. On the inside, he could feel the power he had over Ren surge through his nerves, pulse through his veins. Light-headed, he proceeded to the bridge. He was so used to lack of sleep he could do the preparations for today in his head without any problems. Or maybe, he was running on pure dopamine. He knew the technicalities- it was hormones; stupid, thoughtless animal hormones doing this to him, remnants of evolution, dead ends- but it was all new to him and he couldn’t remember ever having felt this way. He made a conscious decision to enjoy it, as long as it would last. Ride the high the hormones gave him.   
He walked on to the bridge with his chin held high. Crew members were staring at him. He didn’t meet their gaze. He had to admit he enjoyed the attention. He could make them or break them with a single command. He could always do that, but today, he actually felt it. His power was tangible, as if it had manifested itself after years of being subdued.   
“General Hux…” one of his new assistants shuffled towards him, clasping a clipboard close to his chest.   
“Yes?”  
“General Pryde requests a hearing with you, General.”  
“General Pryde. Where is he now?”  
“He said he would be in his office most of the day, General.”  
“What’s it about?”  
“He did not say, General.”  
“I have other affairs to tend to. You can tell him I’ll have time for him at the end of the day.”  
“He did mention to me that there was some urgency…”  
“The end. Of. The day. Ensign.”  
He nodded. “Understood, Sir.”  
The next crew member quickly took his place.   
“General Hux?”  
“Hm?” He didn’t even look at her.  
“I have sent you the latest update on the Starkiller core this morning. Please read through it and if you find anything, let us know. We are ready to take orders.”  
“Thank you.”  
No mention of him being late. No questions about where he had been, what he had been doing. Hux realized none of them had the guts to interrogate him. Not one of them challenged him. There wasn’t a single person on the bridge who could stand up to him.   
He dealt with them. He said yes, he said no. He interrupted them before they were done talking because he had already grasped what they wanted to ask. It didn’t tire him; not on this day. Faces came and went without him registering the looks in their eyes, the dissatisfied twitches of their mouths or their suspicious glares. He didn’t care. Nothing could disturb him. Nothing could touch him. He was alone on his own private mountain. Everyone else was stuck in the valley. He was out of their reach. So far above them it was funny to remind himself that they were actually in this same reality with him.   
  
He could still feel his hands on him. All the places he had touched him. He could feel what he had done to him when he walked through the hallways, and when he sat down. He loved the pain. He loved that it still remained inside him. As the day progressed it started to fade, to lose its edge, in the same way the spots in his neck faded and lost their colors. He wanted to hold on to it, to make it worse. To always carry reminders of Kylo with him, like the battle scars on his back. Those pale patches of cut, burnt skin he had licked last night.   
_Kylo_ , he thought. His name alone was enough to send a tremble up his spine. Enough to make him hard. Even in the midst of his working day, surrounded by officers.   
“Next,” he beckoned another hopeful to bring a message to him.  
“Thank you, General Hux,” he said.  
“Speak.”  
“I am responsible for the rationing and housing of stormtrooper squad 95, General.”  
“And?”  
“There have been some disturbances in the quarters last night. I overheard a couple of them as they were discussing hijacking an escape pod. I secured the escape pod and sent the stormtroopers in question to confinement. I would like to have advice on how to deal with the follow-up. And I would like to know if there have been similar incidents. We need to get a clear view on the troops’ work ethic.”  
“Have you informed General Phasma?”  
The officer looked uneasy. “I am not allowed to contact General Phasma of my own accord. I need permission from the bridge…”  
 _Armitage_ , Kylo’s voice rang in his skull. _What is it? You want more?  
Yes_, he thought. _  
_“General Hux?” _  
_“Go ahead, message General Phasma. She’ll want to hear this.” _  
_“Thank you, General.”  
“Dismissed.”  
Kylo sighed in his head. _I want it, too._  
“It’s time for your weekly meeting with the colonies, General.”  
“Be right there.”  
Hux fixed his uniform, rearranging folds and creases nobody’s eyes would be able to distinguish, and left the bridge, headed for the large meeting area where he would be able to talk with the rulers of the First Order’s various large to midsized colonies through remote connections. Getting a stable connection with the more remote systems was usually difficult. Maybe this week they would be able to make some decisions. The weekly get-together was often an exercise in frustration as connections failed, voices were completely inaudible and there was hardly any time to discuss the current events in the colonies, let alone policy.  
When he opened the door to the meeting room he suddenly felt Kylo’s hands on him, squeezing his thighs, caressing the inside of his legs. It tickled. He almost jumped.  
 _Ren. What was that?  
You’re alone. No one will notice…  
I’m about to start the remote meeting with the colonies.  
So? _Kylo’s invisible hands touched him between his legs and grabbed his growing erection. _  
They will notice if you keep doing this.  
Come on_, Kylo begged.   
_No._  
 _I can’t stop thinking about it_.  
 _Control yourself_ , Hux snapped at him.  
 _Oh, fuck_ , Kylo groaned. _Yes, General._  
Hux tapped a few buttons on the remote on the table and sat down as the huge screens started to warm up. They needed to be fully on before he could even hope to secure a good connection. The first screen powered up and showed a surprisingly crisp image of a meeting room not dissimilar from the one Hux was in. After all, the First Order liked to standardize: an indispensable step towards total control and domination.  
“General Hux?”  
“Governor Ikgo. You are the first attendee.”  
“Thank you for your time, General. Shall we wait for the others or do you have a moment? It’s about the Order’s mining company…I am sure you remember the incident we had some time ago?”  
“Yes, I have a moment. Go ahead.”  
Hux conducted his meeting. The remote connection was fairly good. They managed to share relevant details about each colony in a very short time. It helped that Hux was up to date at all times, thanks to his vigilant report reading, but hearing from the governors who were actually there helped immensely. Throughout the meeting, Ren remained silent.   
  
He didn’t hear from him until after his meeting with Pryde.   
As promised, he knocked on Pryde’s door at the very end of the day, after working hours for generals had officially stopped. It wasn’t a provocation per se. Hux’s time was valuable and he had to prioritize. Weekly meetings about the colonies could not be postponed, while he bumped into Pryde’s joyless mug every single day. General Pryde knew this but it did not improve his mood when he finally could lay his eyes on Hux.  
“General,” Hux greeted him with the bare minimum.  
Pryde said nothing. He merely gestured to a seat on the opposite side of his desk. Hux sat down, not feeling secure in the room, with this man. Instead of addressing him, he started to flick through some papers. At first, Hux waited patiently, expecting that he was just searching for the relevant files for the conversation at hand. But no. After he had watched Pryde check and sort the papers on various stacks on his desk and in the filing cabinets behind him for a while he realized he was being played.   
“General Pryde. Could you tell me why you called me to your office today?”  
He tried to sound formal and stern and he liked to think Pryde picked up on it. He dropped the papers he had been looking at.  
“Commander Ren.”  
“What about him?”  
“What about him, indeed.” Pryde got out of his chair and turned his back on Hux, pretending to ponder what he was going to say when Hux knew perfectly well all of this was an act. A stage play for kids much stupider than he was. His brain, tired as it was, was still wired correctly. It was Snoke. This had ‘Snoke’ all over it. Snoke’s problem was that he still saw Ren and himself as teenagers who couldn’t control their emotions. That might not be a stretch when it came to Ren but it certainly was a stretch with him. Hux swallowed. He promised himself that he wouldn’t budge. He wouldn’t give him anything.  
“I heard rumors.”  
“Rumors. Office gossip?”  
“People have been talking. They say that Ren is on his way out.”  
“On his way out of?”  
“The First Order.”  
“On his way towards..?”  
Pryde shrugged. “Who knows? Who can ever be sure with a specimen like that?” Indeed, Hux thought and managed to keep his smiles on the inside. “They say he is led astray by rebels. After all, there were some amongst the Stormtroopers. It’s not far-fetched at all to think he may be looking for a way to establish an army of his own.”  
“And why would he do that, according to your reliable sources?”  
“Well, the First Order wronged him, I suppose, in his tiny little brain.” He chuckled and checked Hux’s response. When he saw none he continued: “Anything less than the throne is an insult to a man as childish and easily slighted as Commander Ren.”  
“You want me to do something about him.”  
“It would be more effective, coming from you.”  
Hux laid his arms on the desk and folded his hands. “Ren is useful, still.”  
“But for how long will he remain so?”  
“I can control him.”  
“For your sake and mine, I hope so, General Hux.” He turned around and started pacing again. His boots hit the floor with a loud click each step he took. It ringed through Hux’s brain and he got very annoyed very quickly. He needed Kylo. His headache was coming back.  
“You need to send him off to a remote colony. Ban him.”  
It didn’t even register. He had heard it, yes. But it took him a moment to let it sink in. Luckily, he was the only one who noticed any delay in his response.   
“Ban Commander Ren, Sir?”  
“Well, you know.” Pryde shrugged, as if it were obvious what he was hinting at when it was anything but. What was he talking about?  
“I’m sorry, Sir, I am afraid I don’t quite understand. I could not possibly ban a Commander of the First Order. That authority is reserved for our most supreme leader, only…”  
Pryde rolled his eyes like a school teacher having to explain fractures for the tenth time and Hux hated him, hated him more than anyone else on the whole vessel- his father took the well-deserved spot of the most hated in the entire galaxy.   
“I would not be discussing this with you if Snoke disapproved of it.”  
“You are saying that this was pre-approved by Snoke himself?”  
“I am saying exactly that.”  
“Why am I not discussing this issue with Snoke, then?”  
“I asked him the same thing. The problem is, our beloved leader is occupied. He is speaking to Commander Ren right now.”  
In an instant, it all became clear to Hux.   
It didn’t really matter that Snoke did not know what was going on, exactly. The guess that something was up was more than enough to spring into action. Hux cursed himself for only finding out now, since this was Snoke’s usual modus operandi- create a false sense of comfort, of trust, all the while setting up the pieces for a very painful and embarrassing checkmate.   
Snoke was banning Kylo- he knew not for how long, but anything longer than a couple of hours was too much for him, now- and what was worse: Hux would be the one to do it.   
And he knew that Kylo understood, and that he would never hold it against him. Maybe, in a way, this would only make their connection stronger. There was a good chance, especially on Ren’s side. Defying all forms of authority, standing for his own beliefs- wasn’t that what defined him? Hux felt his heart beating, helplessly, still, when he was suddenly hit with a particular part of the man he loved so very much. He loved him, yes, he guessed he did. What better time to come to terms with it, a couple of hours before saying goodbye to him?   
“Send the Knights of Ren with him, too.”  
Pryde’s prying eyes rested on Hux’s face, but even they would not be able to identify any signs of distress.  
“I trust that you will do this job in your usual professionality.”  
Hux looked him straight in the eyes. “I will.”  
“Good. The last thing we want is any uproar. As I am sure you know.”  
“I do, Sir.”  
“That will be all, General.”  
Gritting his teeth, Hux got up from the chair. “Thank you, General.”  
  
‘Time is a flat circle.’  
Trying to remember who had said that, in those words, Hux walked with Ren towards the shuttle. It was different model than the one he had sent him off to previously. It didn’t matter. Everything repeated itself, like the course of a planet spinning around its sun, in endless, futile pursuit of something else, something new, something better.  
Pryde would get his wish; there would be no drama. Wordless were the conversations between Hux and Ren. No noise, no distractions. There was no need for Hux to address Ren in public, so he wouldn’t do that. He would tell Pryde that he had informed Ren of his new position in private, behind closed doors, and that would just have to do. No stormtroopers, no droids would be witness to this scene. It was nothing more than a charade, anyway, and Pryde knew it. Snoke knew it.  
  
 _I guess you have to say something_.  
Hux looked in Ren’s black eyes. To his surprise, he smiled. Waiting for him to speak, waiting for him to make his verdict. He opened his arms, just enough for Hux to notice.  
 _Well?_  
Hux swallowed, looked left to right. Endless rows of stormtroopers, in the depths below. They knew all too well something was up. It was forbidden to stare, but it was obvious that staring still happened. If Hux’s eyes weren’t deceiving him Phasma was among them, staring with the others. As if the troops were holding their collective breath.  
On the periphery of his consciousness, droids and workers continued to work on the ship. There were always repairs to make, always errands to run. They would continue to work after Ren would be gone. Every day, every day that Hux would be here with them. Maybe they could be his comfort, in all of their predictability. Maybe.   
“Commander Ren.”  
“General Hux.”   
“As discussed with Supreme Leader Snoke, I will ban you from this vessel, effective immediately. You have your orders and you are not to return until the First Order summons you back.”  
Determined to not feel bad saying the words- he would _not_ give them that satisfaction- he gathered the courage needed to finish it.  
“Do you understand your orders, Commander Ren?”  
“Oh, I do.”  
“Good.” For a moment, Hux’s eyes slid over Kylo’s features, trying to find sharp edges, angles, places to hold on to. He guessed he had been staring a tad too long when Kylo raised his eyebrows.  
 _‘Dismissed’?  
_ “Dismissed.”  
Kylo smiled. And turned around, walking towards the shuttle. He lifted his left hand in the air and cloaked figures seemed to appear from nowhere in particular. They were with him in seconds, swarming around him like insects; his personal little army. They followed him on the ramp, through the trapdoor. That was their privilege. Hux would remain, nailed to this vessel by the soles of his boots. He wouldn’t leave it. He would go down with it, if the time came. He couldn’t abandon it.   
  
It wasn’t Kylo’s style to look over his shoulder. To look back when saying goodbye. Hux knew. It was fine. To keep up appearances he turned around himself, before the door had closed. His performance had been impeccable: another victory for the First Order. The stormtroopers weren’t even looking at him anymore, that is how boring and on-protocol he had been, and now that Ren was no longer visible, the only chance for a little drama had passed them by. No tantrums today. No one getting carried off, kicking and screaming. Just their redhead General, walking back to the hallways in a steady pace. They wouldn’t see him stagger. Hux kept his chin in the air. For now, he knew that there were things that nobody could ever take from him.   
  
‘I’ll be there when I have time, alright?’ Kylo asked, from wherever he was.  
 _I’ll wait for you_ , Hux answered.  
‘I know you will.’  
 _Kylo_ , Hux sighed.

_Kylo._

Saturday, August 29, 2020  
21:44 PM

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 'Time is a flat circle' - Rust Cohle, True Detective season one, haha.  
> It's the kind of nihilistic outlook on life Hux would have, if I could guess. 
> 
> Thank you all for reading and all your kind words! <3


End file.
